Murder Most Holy

CHAPTER 9

Athelstan woke early the next morning. Cranston was snoring, dead to the world. Athelstan lay for a while. He felt warm and rested. Hearing the first chimes of the bell, he got up and, taking a towel from the wooden lavarium, went out across the mist-shrouded grounds to the monastery bath house. Here he washed and scrubbed himself, threw on his robe, then went back to the kitchen of the guest house, built up the fire and boiled some water in which to shave. He tiptoed upstairs, took out fresh underclothes and a robe from his saddle bag, then breakfasted on the scraps from the meal of the night before.

He knelt for a while, saying his own office, keeping his mind clear and disciplined, before going across to celebrate mass in one of the side chapels of the monastery church. Other priests were doing the same, taking advantage of the time before Lauds to perform their own private office. After he had disrobed and thanked Norbert, who was serving as his sacristan, Athelstan went into the sanctuary behind the high altar, still sweet with the smell of wax candles and incense. As expected, he found a coffin resting on the great wooden pillars on the red carpet, the words ‘Brother Roger obiit 1379’ carved on the lid. Athelstan stroked the smooth pinewood coffin. Later in the day a solemn requiem mass would be sung and Brother Roger’s body laid to rest with other deceased members of the community in the great vault beneath the sanctuary.

Athelstan stood there as other monks came in and knelt on the prie-dieu, making their own private devotions on behalf of their dead comrade. Athelstan waited until they had all gone, answering the call to Divine Office, before kneeling down himself, not so much to pray as to keep himself hidden from the rest of the community as they gathered in the choir stalls to chant the psalms. Athelstan stared round the apse, the huge, half-circular wall which ringed the back of the altar and the statues of the Apostles standing in their niches. Strange, he mused, Alcuin had been praying in this sanctuary when he disappeared, and his own sanctuary at St Erconwald’s held a great mystery. Athelstan looked once more at the statues of the Apostles. Concentrate, he told himself, leave St Erconwald’s alone! Alcuin was praying here, then he disappeared. Brother Roger used the phrase: ‘There should have been twelve’. To what did he refer? The friar studied the deep, wooden coffin and looked back at the wall. An idea occurred to him.

‘Nonsense!’ he whispered, and held his fingers to his lips. ‘Oh, my God, of course! Naturally.’ He crossed his arms to curb his excitement and patiently waited until the service was finished. When the rest of the community filed out to break their fast in the refectory, Athelstan hurried to the guest house.

‘Sir John!’ he shouted, bursting through the door. ‘Cranston, you have slept long enough!’

He heard a loud crash. The coroner came downstairs, thundering like a huge barrel.

‘By the devil’s tits!’ he roared. ‘Can’t a poor law officer sleep?’ He rubbed his sleep-soaked face and peered at Athelstan. ‘You’ve discovered something, haven’t you, you bloody monk?’

‘Yes, Sir John.’

Cranston, tying the points of his breeches, padded into the kitchen. Athelstan realised it was the first time he had seen Sir John with his boots off: in his loose shirt, bulging breeches and stockinged feet, the coroner looked even more like one of his baby sons.

‘What are you smiling at, you bloody monk!’

‘Nothing, Sir John. Sit down.’

‘I’m hungry.’

‘Tell your belly to wait.’

‘Then some mead?’

‘Not on an empty stomach, Sir John. Whatever would Lady Maude say?’

‘Bugger that!’

‘Shall I tell her you said so?’

Cranston bit the quick of his thumb nail.

‘Some watered ale, then you’ll have my attention.’

Athelstan served him and told Cranston about the conclusions he had reached in the sanctuary behind the altar. The coroner heard him out and patted him affectionately on the shoulder.

‘My thoughts exactly,’ he stated. ‘I had wondered whether to follow that path but it seemed so bizarre. Well, it’s heigh-ho to Father Prior. We’ll need his permission.’

‘Not yet, Sir John. After Nones.’

Cranston rose. ‘In which case I’ll do my ablutions and break my fast. You’ll join me?’

‘No, Sir John. Tell the kitchen you are eating for both of us.’

As Cranston stumped back upstairs noisily to wash and dress himself, Athelstan began to study the parchment Fitzwolfe had provided the previous day. He found the entries rather sad and pathetic, a faint echo of his own activities, though Father Theobald seemed to have had little sense of organisation. He had been a tired, sick man, most concerned with burial dues, the building of the death house in the cemetery, and makeshift attempts to mend the roof. Athelstan finally came to a number of other entries: Father Theobald had apparently fallen in the sanctuary and there were notes for the buying of stone from A.Q.D. Athelstan looked at the date: September 1363. This was followed by a series of other payments: ‘For laying the stones in the sanctuary,?6.00 sterling to A.Q.D.’ Athelstan ran his finger along this and other entries.

‘Yes, yes,’ he whispered to himself. ‘But who is A.Q.D?’

Another idea occurred to him and he followed the entries through to January 1364, looking for payments made to Father Theobald to celebrate masses for people who had died but was unable to find the name of any young woman who’d fallen ill, been killed or mysteriously disappeared.

He pushed the manuscript away, absentmindedly nodding as Cranston bellowed that he was going across for food. The friar waited until Cranston closed the door behind him, then he rose, went back up to the upper chamber and lay down on his bed. The coroner would be some time and Athelstan wanted to review the events of the previous day in peace. Something he had seen and heard had struck a chord in his memory, but what? Athelstan went back first to finding Roger’s body in the orchard and plotted the course of events for the rest of that day. At last he found it and smiled in surprise. Of course! He went back downstairs and looked at the entries in Father Theobald’s muniment book. Then he jumped up, clapping his hands like a child. ‘Of course!’ he murmured. ‘Of course! Take that away and everything crumbles!’

Athelstan felt so pleased he found it difficult to contain his excitement. He decided to go for a long walk in the monastery grounds, startling the lay brothers going about their daily tasks with his brisk pace and cheerful salutations. He went down to the stable and was pleased to see Philomel eating away the monastery’s profits. The ostler, a raw-boned lay brother, assured him that the old war horse and Cranston’s mount were being well looked after. Athelstan returned to the guest house to find Sir John waiting for him.

‘You seem mightily pleased, Brother.’

‘We are making progress, Sir John. We are making progress. I feel like a king besieging a castle. The walls are beginning to crumble and soon we will force an entry.’

‘What about my mystery?’ Cranston grumbled.

Athelstan’s eyes strayed to his parchment and pen. ‘Not yet, Sir John. But all things in their time.’

The friar sat down and, using cryptic abbreviations, began to list and organise his own thoughts. Cranston filled himself another tankard of mead, draining the small keg empty, and slumped on a stool, lost in his own gloomy reverie.

The confrontation with Fitzwolfe and the long walk through the city had helped Cranston forget Lady Maude’s fury but now the full import of her words returned: he knew that the scene of the previous day would be as nothing compared to Lady Maude’s fury if he did not settle this matter successfully. The coroner had woken just after Athelstan and spent most of the morning, even during that most sacred and private occasion of breaking his fast, wondering what the solution was to this mystery of the scarlet chamber. He had failed to make any progress and was now considering what he should do about the wager he had accepted. I can’t raise a thousand crowns, he thought morosely. Athelstan’s as poor as a church mouse. To beg from Lady Maude’s relatives would be humiliation indeed. So should he either accept John of Gaunt’s offer of help or be dismissed as a caitiff who did not honour his debts? Cranston ground his teeth together. ‘Hell’s tits!’ he muttered and glared at Athelstan, now lost in his own thoughts. Sir John slammed down the tankard, went outside and stood listening to the tolling of the monastery bells.

‘I shouldn’t be here,’ he muttered. ‘I should be back in my own chamber, taking care of my own problems.’

Suddenly Athelstan was beside him, linking his arm through Cranston’s.

‘Come on, Sir John. One thing at a time. We still have over a week left before we return to the Savoy Palace.’

Cranston felt himself relax. ‘We?’ he asked hopefully.

‘Of course, Sir John. If you fail, then I must be there. But,’ he released the coroner’s arm and squeezed Cranston’s podgy elbow, ‘with God’s help, all will be well. Now come, the prior awaits us.’

They found the Inner Chapter assembled in Father Anselm’s chamber, grouped as they had been on the first day Athelstan had met them. Brothers Peter and Niall now looked anxious and secretive, Brother Henry composed, whilst the Master Inquisitor and Brother Eugenius sat like hunting dogs, glaring at Athelstan and Sir John.

‘Another death,’ Eugenius intoned. ‘And what progress have you made, Athelstan?’

Prior Anselm rapped on the table. ‘Let our brother speak, Eugenius, and be more temperate. We will begin with a prayer.’ The prior crossed himself, forcing the others to join him as he said a brief prayer to the Holy Ghost for guidance and counsel. ‘Well,’ he resumed briskly, ‘Athelstan, you asked for this meeting?’

‘Father Prior, I thank you, as I do the rest, for joining us here. First, Brother Henry, I read your treatise. I found it lucid and brilliant, difficult to view it as heretical. Secondly, Callixtus did not fall in the library. He was pushed and his skull broken by a candlestick.’ Athelstan held up his hand to quell the agitated questions. ‘I have found the candlestick and My Lord Coroner has viewed and accepted it as proof. Thirdly,’ he continued, ignoring the supercilious smiles of the Inquisitors, ‘Brother Roger has died, but he did not kill himself. He was garrotted and then it was made to look as if he had hanged himself. Fourthly, his death and those of the others are linked to business of this Chapter’s, though how and why I still don’t know. Now I could ask everyone here, including Father Prior, to account for his movements on the days Bruno, Roger and Callixtus died, but Blackfriars is a large community with sprawling buildings. It would take an eternity to establish the facts, if it were even possible.’

‘You do not mention Alcuin?’ Brother Niall spoke up, his abrupt tone betraying his lilting Gaelic accent.

‘Yes,’ added Eugenius. ‘How do we know that Alcuin is not the murderer? Perhaps he still lurks somewhere in Black-friars. After all, Athelstan, you did say it is a sprawling place: it has nooks and crannies rarely if ever visited by anyone.’

‘Nonsense!’ snapped Anselm.

‘No, Father Prior, Eugenius is right,’ Athelstan intervened. ‘Brother Alcuin is still here, though he’s dead.’

‘Where?’ they all chorused at once.

‘Father Prior, when is the Requiem Mass sung for Roger?’

‘At noon today. We cannot wait until tomorrow. The church is very strict. No Requiem Masses to be sung on a Sunday.’

‘Then, Father Prior, I insist that the burial takes place on Monday.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I wish the burial vault beneath the sanctuary to be opened and Bruno’s coffin raised. When it is open, we shall find Brother Alcuin.’

‘Sacrilege!’ the Master Inquisitor shouted. ‘Desecration! Athelstan, you walk on very thin ice.’

‘Sacrilege, my dear Inquisitor, is a matter of the will — as indeed is all sin. I intend no offence to Brother Bruno, may God rest him.’ Athelstan appealed to the prior. ‘You called me here to search out the truth and resolve a dreadful mystery. Brother Bruno’s coffin must be opened.’

‘We object!’ the Inquisitors chorused.

The prior tapped his fingers on the table top. ‘I see no objections to Athelstan’s wish. These matters must be resolved. If you are incorrect, Brother, then nothing is really lost. However, if what you say is true, then some progress may be made.’ Father Anselm lifted a hand-bell and rang it.

A servitor entered and Anselm whispered instructions to him. The man gazed at him in shocked surprise.

‘Do what I say,’ the prior ordered. ‘Tell Brother Norbert, and you yourself get two others. Swear them to silence, and carry out my instructions.’

As soon as the servitor left, Anselm looked round the table.

‘Is there any other matter, Athelstan?’

‘Yes, Father, there is, but Sir John and I must see you alone.’

‘Why?’ William de Conches spoke up. ‘As the Master Inquisitor I demand to be present.’

‘I couldn’t give a pig’s buttocks what you do, man!’ Cranston spoke up. ‘This is an English monastery, albeit under Canon Law, but the Crown’s writ holds here. I, as a principal law officer of the King in this city, demand to see Father Prior by himself.’

‘Agreed,’ Anselm said briskly. ‘Brothers, we shall meet in the sanctuary.’

Athelstan waited till the door closed behind the rest of the group.

‘What is it, Brother?’ asked the prior.

‘Father Prior, the name Hildegarde fascinates me. Who at Blackfriars would be able to place such a name?’

‘It’s not an English one,’ Cranston interrupted. ‘I see lists of many names of jurors and tax payers. Hildegarde’s German.’

The prior rubbed his eyes. ‘Who do you think she might be Athelstan?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe an abbess or one of the saints.’

‘I know of no devotion to such person. But we have an old scholar here, Brother Paul. You remember him, Athelstan? He’s sick now, partially blind and bed-ridden. He spends most of his time in the infirmary. But, come. His mind’s still sharp and we may jog his memory.’

The prior led them out round the cloister garth, through a small side door and across a flower-filled garden to the two-storeyed infirmary. The place smelt sweetly of crushed herbs, soap arid starch, though Athelstan caught the bitter taint of certain potions. The infirmarian took them upstairs and into a long room with rows of beds on either side, each hidden behind its own curtain. Anselm whispered a few words to the infirmarian, who pointed to an alcove at the far end, cordoned off by a white, green-edged cloth hanging from a bright brass bar.

‘You’ll find Brother Paul there. He’s in good fettle. He has been promised some time to sit in the garden.’

Anselm, followed by Athelstan and Cranston, strode across the bright polished floor. The prior pulled back the cloth. An old man lay with his head against a bolster: the hair round his tonsure was snow-white, his face thin and high cheek-boned under eyes once bright but now covered by a milky white film.

‘Who is it?’ The voice was surprisingly strong.

‘It’s Father Prior. I have brought two friends, Sir John Cranston and young Athelstan.’

Cranston nudged his colleague playfully.

‘Young Athelstan!’ he whispered in mimicry.

‘I know you, Cranston.’ Brother Paul turned his head. ‘I often worked in Newgate, the Fleet and Marshalsea prisons, hearing the confessions of condemned felons. Do you know, they always called you a bastard?’ The old friar’s lips parted in a toothless grin. ‘Mind you,’ he added, ‘a just, even compassionate, bastard!’

Cranston pushed his way past the others and crouched by the bed.

‘Of course,’ he muttered, ‘I remember you. The friar who always insisted on cases being reviewed. You saved many a man from the hangman’s noose.’

The old friar cackled with laughter, his hand going out to fall on Sir John’s shoulder.

‘Still as slender as ever, Sir John.’ Father Paul moved his hand. ‘Athelstan, where are you, you young scapegrace?’

He clasped the old man’s spotted, vein-streaked hand and his eyes brimmed with tears for he remembered Father Paul: he had been old when Athelstan was a novice, but vigorous, sharp, with an incisive brain and a cutting tongue. He used to lecture the novices in philosophy, theology and the subjects of the Quadrivium.

‘Still studying the stars, Brother, are we?’

Athelstan patted the old man’s hand.

‘I always remember you quoting the psalms, Father Paul: “Who shall know the ways of the Lord? As the heavens and its lights are far above the earth so are his ways above ours.’”

‘You haven’t quoted correctly!’ the old friar snapped. ‘You were always a dreamer. Anyway, what do you want with me, a sick old man?’

‘Does the name Hildegarde mean anything to you?’

Brother Paul neighed with laughter.

‘Are you here to dig over the sins of my youth?’ he snorted, and turned his head in the direction of Athelstan’s voice. ‘My eyes are gone, Brother Athelstan, but my memory is still sharp. Hildegarde is a woman’s name. I remember you, with your dark eyes and soft heart. Do you remember what I told you above love? How dreadful it can be for a priest to meet someone he really loves?’ The old friar turned away, bony fingers scrabbling at his cheeks. ‘I once knew a woman called Hildegarde. She had the face of an angel and a heart as wicked as sin.’ He laughed. ‘But I suppose that’s not the Hildegarde you are searching for? You are looking for a German woman, an abbess, who lived — what? — a hundred and twenty, a hundred and fifty years ago.’ He paused and stared blindly at the ceiling.

‘What more can you tell us?’ the prior asked.

The old man shook his head wearily. ‘I can’t, Father Superior, but the library will. Yes, yes, look in the library.’ His hand fell away. ‘Over the passing of years,’ he whispered, ‘I know the name but can’t tell you the reason why.’

Athelstan took his hand and squeezed it gently.

‘Thank you, Father Paul.’

The old friar pulled Athelstan’s wrist.

‘May the Lord keep you. May he show his face to you and smile. May he bless you and keep you all the days of your life.’

He gently removed his hand and they quietly left the in firmary, Athelstan guiltily realising how much he owed to and yet how much he had forgotten of his life at Blackfriars. Outside in the flower garden, Cranston went to admire a rose bush in full bloom. Athelstan took his superior’s arm and whispered urgently.

‘Father, we now have a number of connections; Alcuin and Callixtus were linked by the name Hildegarde. Callixtus was killed in the library, not from a fall but by a blow with a candlestick. To be blunt, I believe Callixtus was looking for some book or tract related to this Hildegarde.’ Athelstan paused. ‘Father, I believe that the name Hildegarde lies at the root of all the murders perpetrated here.’

Father Prior took a deep breath and stared up at the blue sky. ‘I see the connections, Brother Athelstan, but what in the sweet Lord’s name does the name Hildegarde have to do with the meeting of the Inner Chapter?’ He flung up his hands in frustration. ‘You have seen our library, Brother. Shelf after shelf of books, some three to four hundred pages deep. You could spend a lifetime searching there. And how do we know the assassin hasn’t already found what Callixtus was looking for?’

‘Perhaps he has, but let’s be optimistic. If he hasn’t then we have checked him. Any further searching amongst the books now would attract our attention.’

Cranston rejoined them, a young, dew-wet rose between his fingers.

‘I heard what you said, Father Prior, but let old Sir John apply the knife of logic. Callixtus was at the top of the ladder, yes?’ He breathed in stertorously. ‘He was therefore looking for a book on the top shelf. We know roughly where the ladder was positioned.’ Cranston stuck out his great stomach. ‘Ergo,’ he announced, mimicking Athelstan, ‘the conclusion’s obvious. Callixtus may well have discovered something about this famous Hildegarde in one of the books. Now we can’t spend our time in the library, that would alarm our quarry, but that splendid lay brother who supplies me with mead. . what’s his name?’

‘Norbert.’

‘Yes, we’ll use him.’

The prior agreed and they went back into the main monastery buildings where Anselm sent a servitor with instructions for Norbert to meet them in the library. They found the scriptorium and the library fairly deserted and those few monks working there quietly left at the prior’s request. Brother Norbert, breathless from running, soon joined them. Athelstan took the young lay brother by the arm to the spot where Brother Callixtus had lain and looked up at the shelves towering above them.

‘Norbert, after our business in the chapel is finished, I wish you to begin removing all the books from the three top shelves.’ He pointed to the place. ‘Only these books. I want them moved, if necessary one at a time, to the guest house without anyone seeing you. Do you understand?’

The young lay brother nodded. Athelstan rubbed his hands.

‘Good!’ He looked at his companions. ‘I am sure Brother Norbert can keep a still tongue in his head. Now, come. The others in the chapel must be fretting with impatience.’

Athelstan was right. The rest of the Inner Chapter were sitting in the stalls of the sanctuary grumbling quietly amongst themselves whilst, behind the high altar, a sweating, red-faced lay brother was prising loose the flagstones over the burial vault. Norbert joined in whilst Father Prior made desultory conversation until a sweat-soaked lay brother called out: ‘Father Prior, all is ready!’

Athelstan, Cranston and the rest went round the high altar Roger’s coffin had been moved to the side; the red carpet was rolled up and the flagstones lifted as well as the supporting oak beams beneath so the vault now lay open. Brother Norbert and his companions now took a pair of ladders and gingerly went down into the vault. Father Prior passed a lighted candle.

Cranston looked down and shivered. He could glimpse coffins and realised that the vault was a vast mausoleum. Ropes snaked down.

‘We have found Bruno’s coffin!’ Norbert’s voice sounded hollow, ghostly, as if speaking from an abyss.

They heard a sliding noise, a slight crash and muffled oaths. Norbert and a lay brother re-emerged, throwing up the rope before they climbed back into the sanctuary.

‘Brother Bruno’s coffin now lies directly beneath us.’ Norbert gasped. ‘But we need help. It is very heavy!’

At the prior’s command everyone, Cranston and Athelstan included, began to pull at the ropes. It proved an onerous task for the pinewood coffin weighed like lead.

‘Of course,’ Father Prior gasped, ‘to lower a coffin is easy.’ He smiled thinly. ‘But who’d think we would ever have to raise one?’

All of them pulled at the ropes but the task proved too much and Father Prior reluctantly conceded more help was needed. They paused for a while, letting the ropes down again, and Norbert was despatched to seek further assistance.

‘We might as well.’ Father Prior shrugged. ‘The rest of the community will get to know anyway.’

Norbert returned. Father Prior told the new helpers to keep a still tongue in their heads. This time others went down the ladder into the vault and eventually the great pinewood coffin was raised out of the vault and placed on one side of the sanctuary. Father Prior thanked everyone and dismissed the lay brothers, except for Brother Norbert. Athelstan’s arms and shoulders now ached whilst Cranston’s face was red as a plum, his face and neck soaked in sweat.

‘I could murder a cup of sack,’ he muttered. ‘Hell’s teeth, Athelstan! Brother Bruno seemed more reluctant to leave the grave than to go into it!’

‘There’s a reason for that, Sir John.’

Athelstan, not waiting for Father Prior, went across to the coffin and, having borrowed Cranston’s long stabbing dagger, began to prise the lid loose. A putrid smell of decay began to seep through the sanctuary even as the rest began to grumble at what he did. Father Prior opened his mouth to object but Athelstan defiantly continued, aided and helped by Cranston, who wrapped his cloak round his neck to cover his mouth and nose against the growing stench of decomposition. The chorus of disapproval grew so Cranston, pulling the cloak down, bellowed at them angrily: ‘If you can’t stand the stench, light some bloody incense!’

The prior agreed. Thuribles, charcoal and incense were brought. The charcoal was lit and incense scattered around the red hot coals. At last the coffin lid was loose. Athelstan shoved it away, even as he turned to gag at the dreadful smell which seeped through the incense-filled sanctuary like dirt in clear water.

‘Oh, my God!’ Cranston murmured.

Athelstan, pinching his nostrils, went back and looked over the lid of the coffin.

‘I have seen some terrible sights,’ Cranston declared, ‘but in God’s name. .’

The decomposing body of Brother Bruno lay in a thin gauze sheet but, face down on top, was the gas-filled, rapidly decaying corpse of Brother Alcuin. Despite the stench and the apparent marks of decomposition, Athelstan stretched out his hand and touched the murdered man gently on the back of his head.

‘Oh, sweet Jesus, Mary’s son, have pity on you and may God forgive you all your sins!’

Athelstan stared down at this man he had once known, prayed with, eaten and drunk with, now brutally murdered, his corpse stuffed into a coffin like some filthy rag. He gently half-pushed the body over, trying not to look at the staring eyes and blue-black face, the protuberant swollen tongue. He pulled down the collar of the dead friar’s gown and saw the thin, purplish line of a garrotte.

‘For God’s sake, Father Prior!’ Cranston called out.

Anselm, white-faced, his eyes staring in horror, just stood rooted to the spot. The others, unable to look, had gone back round the altar, except for Brother Norbert.

‘You seem a sturdy fellow,’ Cranston continued. ‘Quick, get a burial sheet and coffin. Go on, man!’

Norbert scurried off and Cranston reasserted himself. He took Athelstan by the arm.

‘Come on, Brother,’ he said gently. ‘Come away. Father Prior needs your help.’

Athelstan tore his eyes from the disfigured corpse and walked over to Anselm.

‘Father Prior,’ he whispered, and grasped Anselm’s hand which felt like ice. ‘Father, come with us.’ He gripped the man by the shoulder and gave him a vigorous shake. ‘There’s nothing we can do here.’