The hanging tree, p.7
The Hanging Tree, page 7
Athelstan stared around. Cresset torches now flared, their flames leaping like dancers in the ice-cold breeze, which seeped through the gaps, cracks and vents of this ancient church. Lanterns dully glowed whilst great tallow candles had also been lit and positioned around this place of slaughter. Beyond this circle of light were grouped Athelstan’s parishioners: dark shrouded figures, hoods, cowls and capuchons pulled close. They stood silent witnesses as their beloved priest, the little olive-skinned Dominican, studied the corpse of a soul long gone to God.
Athelstan crossed himself and clambered to his feet. He certainly felt weary after his return from Westminster. He’d hardly disembarked at the stew steps, when the Hangman of Rochester, along with Crispin the Carpenter and Watkin the Dung Collector, had emerged from the dark to inform him about the murder.
‘I hear them whispering, Father.’ Thomas the Toad coughed as he edged into the pool of light around his priest. ‘I hear them talking. They gossip and jibber in this corner or that. Sometimes they climb the pillars and sit on the rafters. But they always chatter.’
‘In God’s name who?’ Watkin demanded, his voice hoarse and carrying.
‘The dead,’ Thomas declared.
‘Never mind that!’ Pike the Ditcher, his thin face all querulous, lifted his hands as he approached his priest. ‘In God’s name, Father,’ he demanded, ‘what do we do now?’
‘You mean the dead,’ Thomas the Toad declared. ‘I’ll tell them what to do. They’ll listen to me.’
Athelstan sensed Thomas would not be silenced, and this would inevitably lead to a very fractious row, even if it were only to ease the tension.
‘Before we ask the dead and have a bitter disagreement,’ Athelstan’s voice rang around the shadow-filled nave, ‘can I ask what any of you know about this murder?’
‘Father, I can tell you something.’ Benedicta stepped forward, her face made even more beautiful by the dark blue, lace-fringed hood. She pointed at the corpse. ‘Clement the Key-Master is a friend, a distant kinsman of Crispin’s.’
Athelstan raised a hand for silence as the carpenter bustled forward. ‘In a while, Crispin. Continue, Benedicta.’
‘Father, it’s cold. The dead do gather. I can see them now like a moving cloud.’
‘Quiet!’ Athelstan stilled both Thomas and the groans of the others. ‘Benedicta, tell me what you know.’
‘Clement arrived just after you left, Father. He was desperate to speak to you. I asked him if he wanted to wait in the priest’s house but he said no. He was most reluctant to go anywhere, and that included The Piebald. So I offered him to stay in the church and he accepted. I informed him how the doors would be locked, though the postern gate in the main door could be opened from the inside so, if he did leave, he would not be able to return. If that did happen, he would have no other choice but to go to The Piebald. He said he would stay so I left.’
‘Locking the church behind you?’
‘Yes, Father. I thought all was well.’
‘And so it should have been.’ Athelstan smiled thinly. ‘But then?’
‘The day wore on. I could hear bells ringing for the different prayers. I thought it was time to check on our church and ensure all was well. I came through the Devil’s door and immediately glimpsed a glow of light. It wasn’t like now with the candles and the lanterns, there was just a flickering glow, only one tallow candle had been lit and placed close to the corpse. I hurried across and saw what you now see. Clement’s corpse and the garrotte around his throat. I summoned Mauger the bell clerk—’
‘And I said we should leave everything as it was,’ the bell clerk interrupted. ‘That we should lock the church and mount a guard until you returned.’
‘Which I now have.’ Athelstan smiled to hide his weariness.
‘Oh my goodness,’ Benedicta exclaimed. ‘Father, forgive me. I forgot all about Blodwyn, our sanctuary man, Blodwyn the Blessed!’
‘Oh yes.’ Bladdersmiff the Beadle moved into the pool of light. ‘Blodwyn was caught filching from the common oven.’
‘He fled first to the priest’s house where I was cleaning and tidying. Father, I apologize, but all the commotion—’
‘No, don’t worry!’
‘Anyway, Father, I brought Blodwyn here. I let him creep in. I asked if he needed food. He said he had wine and some of the bread he’d stolen, so I left him in the sanctuary enclave behind the high altar and, to be truthful, totally forgot about him.’
‘So where is he?’ Watkin, leader of the parish council, now asserted himself. ‘Stay here, Father. Comrades, let us search the church for this fugitive.’
Watkin’s invitation was gleefully accepted by the rest, eagerly joining the hunt for the hapless Blodwyn. A little excitement to break up the monotony of the day. The parishioners hurried off into the darkness, leaving Benedicta and Athelstan to sit on a wall bench.
‘You are well, beloved Benedicta?’
The widow woman laughed softly. ‘I am well, Father, apart from these present troubles. Oh Father, we’ve heard stories about a great robbery at Westminster. Are they true?’
‘Yes,’ Athelstan wearily replied. ‘They are true, Benedicta, a great treasure has been stolen. A veritable king’s ransom; someone will die for that. Master Thibault, and my Lord of Gaunt are beside themselves with fury. You see, months ago, gold and silver were collected and taken to the smelting ovens at the Tower Mint. The coins are fashioned, then taken to the Exchequer of Coin to be counted, weighed and checked. These coins were to repay the huge loans the Lombard Bankers have advanced to our young King. Well, in truth, to my Lord of Gaunt, though it was the King’s name that went on the indenture. Now the gold and silver have gone, the English Crown will have to find fresh coin to pay its longstanding – and very heavy – debt to the Bardi.’ Athelstan rubbed his face. ‘Believe me, Benedicta, the storm is only beginning. I can sense Thibault’s fear. People will seize on this and use it as a weapon against him. There is little more I can tell you about it. However, all is well here in our little kingdom?’
‘Father, Bonaventure hunts. Hubert the hedgehog is firmly ensconced in his bed, whilst Philomel, your old warhorse, lies in his stable, his belly full, his poor head crammed with memories of more sterling days.’
Athelstan smiled, grasped the widow’s hand and squeezed it. ‘Benedicta, without you, God knows what I would do! However, for our present troubles? I doubt if my beloved parishioners will find Blodwyn here, whilst it’s time I was gone. Tomorrow, immediately after the Jesus Mass, tell the hangman and Crispin to break fast with us.’
Athelstan made to get up when the postern in the main door was flung open. The figure who came striding through was cloaked and cowled, a swiftly moving shadow. Athelstan felt a spurt of fear, but relaxed when the man pulled back his hood to reveal a swarthy, sunburnt face.
‘Michael the Painter,’ Benedicta declared.
‘Michael the Cypriot,’ Athelstan retorted, clasping the man’s hand.
Benedicta immediately began to ask about the Cypriot’s wife and twin children. Athelstan sat down and stared at this most recent arrival in his parish. A refugee from Turkish oppression, Michael and his family had fled to London, and soon settled in St Erconwald’s, where the Cypriot had established himself as a most reliable craftsman. ‘A true fixer of things,’ as Benedicta called him.
‘Michael.’ Athelstan sketched a hasty blessing. ‘Have you come about your babies being baptized?’
‘I have, Father.’ Michael’s accent was clipped but clear. He pointed up the nave. ‘But I have also heard there has been a death?’
‘A brutal murder,’ Athelstan replied.
‘God help us all,’ the Cypriot retorted. ‘May St Michael and all his angels set up camp around us. As for me, Father, I became curious about what I heard and saw. Anyway, as I approached the church, a stranger stopped me.’
‘Who?’
‘Father, he was a stranger, all muffled and visored against the cold. He handed me this.’ Michael took a small sack from beneath his cloak. ‘He said it was for you, Father.’
Athelstan grasped the sack and felt its contents. He knew what it was even before he undid the piece of dirty cord and shook the small pieces of charcoal into his hand.
‘Father?’
‘Nothing, Benedicta, nothing for a while.’ Athelstan retied the small sack and thrust it into his pocket. He then rose and clasped both Benedicta and the Cypriot on the shoulder. ‘Goodnight to you both.’ He murmured. ‘Pax et bonum. Do not concern yourselves.’
‘Nothing!’ Norbert No-Nose, one of Pike the Ditcher’s henchmen, shouted as he came out of the darkness. ‘Nothing, Father,’ he repeated. ‘No sign of Blodwyn the Blessed.’ Norbert’s proclamation was echoed by other parishioners, who now gathered around their priest. Athelstan, hiding his tiredness, heard them out, satisfied that they had scoured the church and found no trace of Blodwyn.
‘In which case,’ Athelstan raised a hand, ‘I give you all my most solemn blessing.’
‘Truly solemn?’ Ranulf the Ratcatcher exclaimed.
‘Most solemn indeed.’
‘In which case.’ Ranulf knelt, placing the box containing his two ferrets, Audax and Ferox, on the paving beside him. The rest of his fellow parishioners followed suit, shuffling mud-caked boots and exclaiming at how cold the slabs were. Athelstan bestowed his blessing, wished them goodnight and left. He then paused and turned back.
‘Benedicta, please make sure all candle flames are extinguished and the church is locked.’
‘Of course, Father.’
Athelstan left and quickly strode through God’s Acre. The darkness was truly freezing, closing about him like a shroud.
‘Father,’ a voice sang out. ‘The dead are gathering. They ride the wisps of mist and want to gather for secret conclave.’
‘Goodnight, Thomas the Toad,’ Athelstan called back. ‘Leave the dead – not to mention me – in peace.’
‘God bless you, Father.’
Athelstan trudged on. He was becoming used to Thomas the Toad’s proclamations and his insistence that he could talk to the dead, or rather that the dead spoke to him. He wondered why this eccentric little man hadn’t joined the rest of his parishioners in the hunt for Blodwyn. But, there again, Thomas was a law unto himself. The friar reached the priest’s house, unlatched the door and went in, securing it firmly behind him.
‘This small cottage,’ Athelstan whispered, ‘is a gift from God and greatly comforts me.’ He stared round and rubbed his hands. The fire had been built up. The bowl on the tripod above it was full of hot, steaming oatmeal. Fresh bread had been left in a linen cloth, along with small pots of honey and butter, whilst the floor and table had been scrubbed to perfection. Athelstan crossed himself, put down his satchel and went over to the lectern. He took the book resting there and sat down at the large kitchen table. He put his face in his hands, sighed, then rose to fetch a stoup of ale from the small buttery.
‘So, friar,’ he whispered to himself, ‘calm yourself. Distract your mind from the cares of the day.’
He opened the psalter that Prior Anselm had loaned him from the great library of Blackfriars, the motherhouse of the Dominicans just across the Thames. Athelstan loved to leaf through this, examining the jewel-like miniature pictures, each a story in itself with its ornate script and mythical creatures. Athelstan turned to his favourite, where demon bats hung upside down from a vine tree. Each of the grapes contained a different face, be it pig, fox, rat or badger. Beneath the vine, horn-headed devils boiled a drunkard in a bubbling vat of scalding water. The picture overleaf depicted Murder. Athelstan liked nothing better than to study the intricate, highly coloured picture, where Murder was portrayed as a young, flaxen-haired lady of the court, in her brilliantly hued gown and demure white veil. At first glance, a vision of beauty, except for the dagger the woman concealed in one hand and a poisoned chalice in the other, the tainted wine bubbling around the goblet’s jewel-encrusted rim.
The picture made Athelstan reflect on the day and his meeting with the Kingdom of Darkness which sheltered the murderers he was hunting. He put the book down, stared at the fire and recalled Flambard’s Tower, that grim donjon with its specially fortified doors. In his mind’s eye, Athelstan went through into the tower. He would ring the bell, and the one in the treasure chamber was supposed to peal a reply. Athelstan imagined going up that winding, steep, narrow staircase. He would have to carefully search for the trip cord stretched across each eighth step. At the top the door was locked. Nevertheless, the assassin went through. And then what? The chamber was guarded. Despencer and his four comrades were all mailed clerks, veterans of the battlefield. Nonetheless, each and every one of them had been cruelly garrotted without the slightest hint of any resistance, by men trained to sell their lives dearly. So how was it done? If the assassin had attacked one of the clerks, surely the others would have intervened? However, all five went as quietly into the dark as lambs to the slaughter, with no sign of any resistance or defence. Once the killing was over, the assassin … Athelstan glanced up, or was it more than one? Yet, surely, if that was the case, Despencer and his comrades would have disputed their entrance?
‘Whatever,’ Athelstan murmured. ‘The assassin then plundered the treasure chamber and removed thousands of gold and silver coins. But how?’ he asked himself. ‘Not down those steep, sharp steps, surely?’ He and Cranston had also examined the latrine, its privy hole and chute stretching down to that barrel, half full of stinking, putrid waste. Then there was the burnt charcoal left in the sacks. Was that a sneering, contemptuous gesture by the Carbonari? But why? Why bring themselves to the attention of everyone? Did they have some longstanding feud with the Bardi and the other Lombard banks? Was there in truth more than one assassin, a solitary robber? But, there again, that brought him back to the vexed question of how Despencer and his comrades were overcome. Athelstan shook his head. ‘The gold and silver,’ he whispered, ‘would surely need more than one man to carry it away?’
Athelstan closed his eyes. Who could deploy, he wondered, an army of accomplices? One of the riffler chiefs of London? A gang leader? Yet, why stop there? Conteza was powerful and well supported but, there again, Athelstan grimaced, so is Master Thibault. Was the robbery and the horrid murders the result of some clever, subtle conspiracy? Was Master Thibault intent on filling the pockets and purses of himself as well as his Master Gaunt? Or did Conteza wish to steal the treasure hoard for himself and his bank, then insist that the English Crown honour its debt, so a fresh payment be made?
Athelstan’s eyes grew heavy, but he started at the frantic scratching at the door. Athelstan rose and opened it. Bonaventure sped in like an arrow towards the fire. The great tomcat then stretched out, revelling in the warmth. Athelstan returned to his reflections. ‘That thief, that murderous thief,’ he exclaimed to a now curious Bonaventure, ‘tried to kill me and Sir John in that crypt. He was almost caught in the act.’ Athelstan paused. ‘And yet, if he had been allowed to continue for even a few breaths …’ Athelstan fell silent. The assassin had been unsuccessful, but he had, perhaps, destroyed evidence in that gloomy crypt. Athelstan prayed that was not the case because he had a growing certainty, despite all appearances to the contrary, that the crypt had definitely played an important part in the great robbery, though for the life of him he could not say how.
Had that same assassin, he wondered, actually crossed to Southwark to leave that bag of charcoal? But why? A warning? A threat? Was the murder in St Erconwald’s connected in any way with those in the Exchequer of Coin at Westminster? Athelstan shifted and started in his chair, his eyes growing increasingly heavy. ‘Enough is enough.’ He whispered. Bonaventure had now leapt onto the table and was studying him curiously with his one good eye. ‘Bonaventure,’ Athelstan blessed his feline companion, ‘the day is done, my Lord Cat, and so are we. Come, we are for the dark, my friend.’
PART THREE
‘Some desire the gold their words do bring.’
Athelstan woke early the next morning after a deep, refreshing sleep. He washed, shaved, donned his robe and sandals and, with Bonaventure solemnly following, went down to the church to celebrate his Jesus Mass. In theory, Athelstan reflected, no services should be celebrated in St Erconwald’s following the hideous murder the day before. However, as Athelstan confessed to Mauger whilst he vested for Mass, it would take weeks to deal with the archdeacon’s chancery so he would reconsecrate the church himself. Athelstan then celebrated his Mass with the majority of his parishioners crowding beneath the rood screen. So many that the friar deeply suspected they had not come to greet the gospel, but to hear about the murder, their curiosity much sharper than any devotion. Once the Mass was finished, Athelstan, ignoring the questions of his parishioners, gave instructions to Mauger and hurried back to the priest’s house, where Benedicta, Crispin and the Hangman of Rochester joined him for hot scones and a pot of morning ale from Merrylegs’ pastry shop. Athelstan blessed the food before inviting his guests to eat and drink. They did so, Benedicta assuring her priest that Mauger would look after both sanctuary and sacristy, adding that Clement the Key-Master’s corpse was now honourably ensconced in the parish death house.
‘Where was he from?’ Athelstan put down his pewter cup. ‘He was a relative of yours, Crispin?’
‘A distant kinsman, Father.’
‘And what was he doing at St Erconwald’s? I understand he came to visit me but why?’ Crispin just grimaced, his thin, pasty face taut and anxious. He winked at the priest, before glancing at the others sitting around the table. ‘Come Crispin,’ Athelstan spread his hands, ‘you know you can trust everyone seated here. Your relative has been brutally murdered. I want to discover the truth. I need to trap the perpetrator, so he is caught fast, judged and hanged.’
‘Clement was a good man,’ Crispin blurted out. ‘He was kind, thoughtful and, above all, most skilled in his trade.’
