Stone of destiny, p.3
Stone of Destiny, page 3
The sacristan intoned and the community replied with one voice. The plain-chant swept on, rising to fill the great open space of the abbey church as the first light of dawn began to prick then dazzle through the brilliantly painted windows above the stalls. Shadows shifted and curled. Incense plumed from smoking thuribles, drifting in clouds to bathe and dampen the stone-carved faces of angels and demons which decorated the soaring white walls of the nearby sanctuary. The psalm ended. Brother Sylvester, principal sacristan, stepped back on to the lectern to read from the Prophet Daniel, a dire, sombre passage about looking into the visions of the night to see the Abomination of the Desolation standing in the Holy Place. He had hardly finished this chilling prophecy when the Abomination, lurking in that sacred shrine, struck like a well-aimed arrow or falling blade. A chilling cry of the deepest pain cut like a spear hissing through the chill air of the sanctuary. Another cry echoed, followed by a hideous crashing in the stalls. Lauds abruptly ended. Brother Sylvester left the lectern and hurried up to where monks were gathered around one of their comrades, who lay half wedged against the choir stall, retching and jerking like a man possessed. Sylvester asked the brothers to withdraw. Once they had, Sylvester crouched down. The fallen monk now lay still and silent, his body strangely rigid, his white skeletal face half turned to show one glassy dead eye, whilst a dark mucus seeped between the stricken monk’s half-open, bloodless lips.
‘It’s your sacristan!’
Sylvester turned at a tap on his shoulder and stared up at the pale-faced Prior Norbert, infirmarian, leech and apothecary of the great Abbey.
‘It’s Robert,’ the infirmarian said. ‘Let me look.’
Sylvester rose and stepped away to allow Norbert to kneel beside the now silent Robert. The infirmarian pressed his hands against the fallen monk’s throat then both sides of the neck. He leaned down, his sharp, beak-like nose sniffed at the victim’s mouth.
‘Undoubtedly,’ he hissed over his shoulder, ‘poison! Brother Sylvester, your assistant has been cruelly poisoned.’
PART TWO
‘Behold the body is laid in the box.’
Later that same Sunday morning, so bitterly cold that the iron-hard frost which had crept through London still held fast, Brother Athelstan, who wished he felt warmer, crossed himself and murmured his usual prayer for patience. Parish priest of St Erconwald’s, the Dominican friar regarded his parish as a token of reparation for what he now called ‘sins of his youth’.
‘Sometimes,’ Athelstan whispered to himself, ‘I do think I have repaid in full!’
‘What was that, Father?’ Watkin the dung collector and self-appointed leader of the parish council, rose to his feet. He beat his leather jerkin, so gusts of smelly dust rose to mingle with the incense, candle smoke and kissing bread coated with sweet wine. Such fragrances always lingered after Athelstan had celebrated his Jesus Mass, usually – but apparently not today – a time of quiet reflection.
‘What was that, Father?’ Watkin repeated.
Athelstan simply sketched a blessing in the air. He then smiled at his parish council seated along three benches, positioned to face the celebrant’s chair that had been brought especially from the sanctuary so Athelstan could preside over this meeting. The friar stared around, as if to ensure all was well. Mauger the bell clerk was sitting at his chancery table, now covered with sheets of vellum, inkpots, sander and quill pens. All the parish documents had been taken from their great coffer along with the parish seal. These included the Blood Book, which nestled close to the Register of Parish Proceedings and the Requiem Book; this listed the names of the dead whose relatives had paid for chantry Masses to be sung for their souls.
‘Everything is ready, Father.’
‘Is it now, Watkin?’ Athelstan murmured. ‘Is it now?’ Athelstan gestured at the dung collector. ‘Sit down and wait for a while. And that goes for you too.’ Athelstan pointed at Pike the ditcher, Watkin’s henchman and close associate in all the mischief his parishioners planned and perpetrated. ‘I am waiting …’ Athelstan raised his voice so it rang around the ancient, cavernous church. ‘I am waiting for a certain individual to arrive.’ Athelstan paused. ‘No less a person than Remart the relic seller who, I believe, is touting a powerful relic …’ Athelstan’s declaration provoked a profound silence. The friar smiled at himself. He had given the wandering relic seller permission to set up home in the deserted old death house which stood at the centre of God’s Acre, that broad, unkempt cemetery which surrounded St Erconwald’s. Remart had hardly settled in before he was drawn into mischief, conspiring with the others in the dimly lit taproom of The Piebald tavern, a place Athelstan considered to be the parish’s second church. The taproom was a veritable cauldron, where all kinds of deceitful mischief were cooked, garnished and prepared. The matter in hand was no different. Remart would eventually arrive and, until then, Athelstan would remain silent. He was certainly determined not to be drawn into the furious debate now bubbling beneath the surface over who should play whom in the parish’s planned Nativity play. There was more pressing business. Long before Mass, Tiptoft, Cranston’s red-haired courier, had roused Athelstan with a cryptic message from the Lord High Coroner that Sir John would visit his secretarius Brother Athelstan shortly after the Jesus Mass. Cranston’s courier, clothed in his usual Lincoln green, could offer no further information, except that Sir John hoped to bring a visitor.
‘Father.’ Athelstan glanced up. Watkin sat with his hand raised. ‘Father, can I play Herod?’
‘I told you, Watkin, that must wait. So talk amongst yourselves.’
Athelstan rose and walked over to the rather battered baptismal font which stood in the shadows close to the main door. Athelstan crouched down as if studying the delicate paintings that the parish artist had begun to create there, filling the cracks and tears in the stone with brilliant colours to highlight the different scenes. Athelstan hoped that his absorption with the font would distract his parishioners, who were now heatedly whispering amongst themselves. Athelstan continued to crouch and study the miniature images celebrating the Sacrament of Baptism: jugs of flowing water; the Christ Child surrounded by heavenly cherubs; fiery demons being pressed back by the water of Baptism into a sea of flaring charcoal. Athelstan felt something brush his sandaled foot. He turned and smiled at Bonaventure, the great one-eyed tomcat who finished his morning circuit of the church to hunt and kill any mice who dared to nest there.
‘Good morrow, my friend,’ Athelstan murmured. Bonaventure simply meowed and stretched, the usual sign that he was impatient for his morning milk. ‘We are all waiting, Bonaventure …’
The corpse door suddenly crashed open. Athelstan rose as Bonaventure raced to investigate.
‘Remart!’ Athelstan exclaimed. ‘Where have you been?’
The lank-haired relic seller, a tall beanpole of a man, simply raised a hand then went back outside. He returned pushing a battered wheelbarrow carrying a long arrow chest. At Athelstan’s direction, Remart, muttering his apologies, pushed the barrow into the space between Athelstan’s sanctuary chair and Mauger’s chancery table. He then removed the lid and Athelstan stared down at what he always suspected.
‘This!’ Athelstan declared, pointing down at the corpse of a mummified monkey, ‘this,’ he repeated, ‘is definitely not the body of the pygmy who reportedly accompanied the Three Wise Men to Bethlehem. He certainly was not captured by Herod’s soldiers and executed. Let me make it very clear, these are not the mortal remains of a martyr, like those of the Holy Innocents who suffered and died in the cause of Christ’s birth.’ Athelstan wiped the spittle from his lips. ‘I am furious,’ he bellowed, ‘furious at such sacrilege and stupidity, if any of you know what that means.’ Athelstan paused. His parish council now cowered on their benches, heads down, not staring at this little friar garbed in the black and white robe and mantle of the Dominican Order. In the main, Athelstan was always gentle and kind, reflected in his smooth, olive-skinned face, full mouth and expressive deep-set eyes. However, his parishioners also knew how Athelstan battled against a furious hot temper. On the rare occasion this was unleashed, his flock was only too willing to scatter. This was such an occasion.
The ominous silence deepened. Mauger became interested in the sharp nib of his quill pen, his fellow parishioners stared down at the floor. Eventually Watkin leaned forward to catch the gaze of Benedicta, the widow woman, her lovely face and long, raven-black hair framed by a dark-blue hood edged with squirrel fur. The widow woman who had a special place in Athelstan’s heart, nodded understandingly at Watkin. Benedicta rose and walked over to where Athelstan stood, glaring down at the grotesque sprawled in the arrow chest.
‘Father,’ she murmured, ‘how did you get to know about all this mummery?’
Athelstan took a deep breath and half grinned at this woman whom he secretly described as ‘lovely of form, lovely of face and lovely of soul.’
‘Sit down, Benedicta. Don’t worry.’ Athelstan’s grin widened. ‘I will keep calm and composed.’
Benedicta returned to her seat whilst Athelstan sat down in the throne-like sanctuary chair.
‘Let me begin,’ he declared. ‘Westminster Abbey houses the Blackrobes, the Benedictines. Their sacristan is not only in charge of the sanctuary and all its precious objects, but indeed the security of the abbey as well, be it door or gate. Now the sacristan, a Brother Sylvester, a formidable man, or so I understood, nourished a pet monkey.’ Athelstan raised a hand to quell the clamour from his parishioners. ‘He called the creature Barak and was very attached to it. Some days ago, the monkey escaped. God knows how, but it did. Now, late yesterday evening I was visited by the Sanctus Man who,’ Athelstan again raised his hand to quell the chatter of his parishioners, ‘as you know, is a self-appointed authority on relics. Well he should be, shouldn’t he, he sells such rubbish himself. The sanctuary man apparently visited The Piebald tavern.’ Athelstan turned in his chair to glare at Joscelyn, the one-armed former river pirate and now the proud owner of The Piebald. The taverner lounged disconsolately between two of his henchmen, Crispin the carpenter and Ranulf the rat-catcher, who sat nursing his cages containing his beloved and ever noisy ferrets, Audax and Ferox.
‘On display in the taproom,’ Athelstan continued, ‘was this mummified corpse. You, Remart, supported by others who really should have known better, claimed it to be the naked corpse of a pygmy. In truth, these are the gruesome remains of Barak the monkey. I can see its neck has been savaged.’ Athelstan rose and walked over to the arrow box, staring down at Barak’s mortal remains. Athelstan peered at the monkey’s right wrist. He was searching for an injury which, according to the Sanctus Man, was one of the creature’s distinguishing marks. However, the recent mummification process, as well as the ripening of dead skin and muscle, seemed to have disguised this. Athelstan crossed himself and silently conceded that the black-haired monkey with its tight, crumpled face, long legs and arms could be presented as a pygmy to those who’d never seen such a monkey, never mind a pygmy. He could make out the wounds in the throat, probably the work of one of the savage wild dogs which prowled Westminster. These mongrels were so ferocious, Gaunt had ordered them to be killed on sight. Undoubtedly the corpse had later been found and recently embalmed, using every artifice to make the monkey more human by pinning its ears back and other subtle changes.
‘The Sanctus Man,’ Athelstan continued, returning to his chair, ‘established that Barak’s corpse was plucked from the Thames by the Fisher of Men. Apparently he’d found it bobbing along the waters, close to the deserted quayside of La Reole, a mere walk from the Fisher’s Chapel of the Drowned Men.’ Athelstan paused. The Fisher of Men was a black-garbed recluse who stayed in the shadows along with his legion of helpers, a coven of grotesques who rejoiced in such names as Hackum, Soulsham, Fleabite, and others who served under the command of their master’s henchman, that human fish Icthus. ‘Well,’ Athelstan clapped his hands softly, though he could see that he had everyone’s attention, ‘the Sanctus Man informed me that Barak’s corpse was sold to a mysterious stranger with a wheelbarrow. At the time, no one knew the monkey’s name or origins. Only when the Sanctus Man heard about the pygmy being exposed to view, for a charge, in the taproom at The Piebald, did he investigate.’
‘Did he know what he was looking for?’ Benedicta asked.
‘One distinctive aspect was an injury to the right paw.’
‘Does this Brother Sylvester now know?’
Athelstan shook his head. He doubted that Sacristan Sylvester would want the corpse back; the animal was dead and that was the end of the matter. The Sanctus Man claimed he had informed Athelstan about what he’d seen to protect the parish from any repercussions. Athelstan understood this, though he also suspected that the Sanctus Man was only too pleased to oust another rival relic seller from the market place.
‘Father,’ Benedicta declared, ‘do you really think people would accept such a story?’ She stifled a laugh behind her hand. ‘I mean, an embalmed monkey?’
‘Remart,’ Athelstan pointed at the relic seller, ‘you of all people can answer that. What do you and your fellow guildsmen peddle as sacred? A swan feather touted as fallen from the wing of the Holy Ghost? A sweat cloth used by St Joseph? A hair brooch allegedly used by the Virgin? Goliath’s toenail? I know of at least six heads of St John the Baptist, a stone kissed by Delilah, not to mention those foreskins taken by Samson from the Philistines.’
‘I have only got one of them, Father,’ Remart interjected.
‘In heaven’s name!’ the friar bellowed back, but then fell silent as Benedicta began to laugh. Others joined in. Athelstan relaxed as the tension swiftly eased. He smiled his thanks at Benedicta and sat down, watching Remart being playfully pushed and poked by the others. Athelstan murmured a prayer as he listened to the good-natured teasing. In truth, St Erconwald’s was crammed with the likes of Remart: souls who floated along the river of life, being swept up and left forsaken by a world they could not control. Even veteran parishioners such as Watkin, Pike, Crispin and Ranulf, not to forget the fair Benedicta, had a history which, in some cases, they’d prefer to keep well hidden.
Remart was certainly one of these. He had appeared in the parish around the Feast of All Souls, last armed with a letter of commendation from Prior Anselm at Blackfriars, the Dominican motherhouse across the river. Apparently Remart had once trained to be a Dominican lay brother but, on his own request, he had left his friary close to Warwick Castle and journeyed south. He had gone to Blackfriars, and Prior Anselm had begged Athelstan to give Remart every help, both shelter and sustenance. Athelstan had done what he could. Godbless, the beggar man, had died earlier in the year along with his pet goat Thaddeus. Athelstan needed someone to occupy the old death house, to look after the cemetery and drive away the warlocks and wizards who liked nothing better than to gather at midnight beneath a rich full moon to practise their black arts and make sacrifice to the demon lords of the air.
‘Father?’
Athelstan broke from his meditations and stared into the lean, bony face of the Hangman of Rochester. His true baptismal name, Giles of Sempringham, was now only a part of the hangman’s tangled, haunted past. A strange, eerie creature, though highly talented, the hangman, with his long, straw-coloured hair, glass-like eyes and death-like pallor, was a well-known figure across the city. The hangman exercised his special skill on execution days, be it outside Newgate, on the broad, smooth meadow of Smithfield, above Tyburn stream or even on the gallows along the approaches to London Bridge.
‘Father, you are staring at me strangely. Are you pleased?’ The hangman gestured at the fresh paintings on the baptismal font. ‘Are you happy with these? It’s the best I could do.’ The hangman fingered the hempen threads which hung either side of his black leather jerkin. The strings had been especially selected to bind and hold the noose around the hands, feet and neck of some condemned felon.
‘I am very pleased.’ Athelstan touched the hangman’s black, gauntleted hand. ‘Giles, your skill as a hangman is only surpassed by your talent to depict the most eye-catching paintings.’
‘Are you waiting for Sir John?’ The hangman’s voice faltered. ‘It’s just that I met Tiptoft crossing London Bridge …’
‘I am waiting …’
‘Is it the Flayer?’ The hangman crouched before Athelstan like a penitent waiting to be shrived.
‘Oh yes, I have heard that name, hideous crimes …’
‘Hideous indeed, Father! A soul definitely bound for hell. The Flayer abducts streetwalkers, the lowest of the low who have no prancing pimp to protect them. The Flayer takes his victims to some dark, reeking dungeon. As you know, Father, so many of these cesspits stretch across the city. Once alone, the Flayer slaughters his victim and peels her skin. God knows what he does with it.’
‘But why?’
‘Some hellish reason, Father. No one knows and so far nothing is done.’ The hangman played with his cords. ‘Ah well, Father,’ he smiled, ‘I have come to tell you of more dangers to your peace of mind. Our miracle play for the Nativity – you are building a crib for it?’ Athelstan nodded. ‘Well, Father, be warned. Judith the mummer wants a living crib. She wants to stage the Nativity story along the streets of the parish. Can you imagine it, Father? Benedicta’s house could be where the Virgin lived. Watkin’s, Herod’s palace. The Piebald inn, with Joscelyn offering his own stable for the Christ Child. So …’ The hangman whirled round as the Devil’s door in the north transept crashed open and Crim the altar boy came hurtling along the nave.
‘Father! Father!’ He cried. ‘Fat Jack,’ Crim abruptly stopped, fingers going to his lips. ‘I shouldn’t have said that, should I? Anyway, Father, Sir John Cranston, the Lord High Coroner, together with a stranger, a Blackrobe, sweeps towards us.’ Crim’s shouted declaration carried through the church, silencing the chatter amongst the parish council. Athelstan whispered his thanks to the hangman and got to his feet just as the postern gate in the main door of the church was flung back.
