The Straw Men

PART ONE

Sir John Cranston, swathed in cloak, muffler and beaver hat, dug in his spurs and coaxed the great destrier, his old war horse Bayonne, closer to the scaffold, which rose like a black shadow against the snowbound countryside around St John’s Priory in Clerkenwell.

‘Do you recognize one of your friends, Sir John?’ A member of his escort, similarly garbed against the cold, called out.

‘I have no friends,’ Cranston replied over his shoulder. ‘At least, not here,’ he whispered to himself. He pushed Bayonne, who began to snort and paw the ground, nearer to the high-branched gallows. ‘I know, I know,’ Sir John soothed. ‘But at least there is no smell.’ Cranston lifted his considerable bulk up in the stirrups and stared at the frozen, decomposed cadaver, its head slightly awry, the thick, hempen rope strangling the scrawny throat like some malignant necklace. Crows and ravens had done their work, pecking out the eyes and all the other tender bits, nose, ears and lips. The corpse’s face was nothing but an icy-white, frozen mask with black holes; the rest of the shrivelled corpse had merged with the shabby tunic the felon had been hanged in. Cranston glimpsed the scrap of leather pinned just beneath the man’s shoulder. No one had bothered to remove it. Cranston did. He unrolled the stiffened leather scrap even as Bayonne, shaking its head in protest, backed away snorting, the hot breath rising like clouds in the freezing morning air.

‘Yes, yes,’ Cranston whispered, ‘we have seen worse, old friend. Remember that row of stakes at Poitiers. .?’

‘Now, what do we have here?’ Cranston peered down at the execution clerk’s bold but faded script. ‘Edmund Cuttler, felon, nip and foist, caught six times, branded twice, hanged once.’ Cranston smiled at the gallows humour, then stared at the pathetic remains of Edmund Cuttler. ‘Nip, foist, bum-tailor, pickpocket — poor old butterfingers caught at last.’ Cranston squinted down at the scrap of parchment and studied the date. Cuttler had been hanged four days before Christmas.

‘Well,’ he murmured, ‘just in time to join the angels, if he didn’t steal their haloes.’ Cranston crossed himself, pattered a prayer for the faithful departed, pinned the execution docket back and turned his horse’s head. Once again Cranston stared along the winding path which snaked north of the old city walls. A cloying river fog had swept in, thickening the dense mist which swirled over Moorfields. A heavy pall of freezing whiteness had descended, smothering sight and sound. Somewhere deep in the fog the bells of Clerkenwell Priory boomed out the summons to divine office, calling the faithful to prayer on this the ninth of January, the Year of our Lord 1381 in the Octave of the Epiphany. Christmas, Yuletide and the Feast of the Kings were long past. No more revelry, Cranston ruefully thought. The green holly with its blood-red berries had withered. No more Christmas feasting on a juice-packed goose or brawn of beef in mustard sauce. The jugs of claret had been filled and emptied. Cranston had danced a merry jig with his lady wife Maude, his twin sons, the poppets, dancing beside him, and Gog and Magog, his two great mastiffs, throwing their heads back to carol their own deep-voiced hymn. No, the feast and the festivities were certainly over. Soon it would be the Feast of St Hilary and the courts would open. Cranston would return to the Guildhall to sit, listen and judge over a long litany of human weakness and mistakes, as well as downright depravity and wickedness. ‘How Master Clumshaw did feloniously beat upon Matilda Luckshim and did cause her death other than by natural means. .’

Bayonne abruptly skidded on a piece of ice. Cranston broke from his brooding. He stared around the bleak-white wilderness then back at his own retinue, an entire conroy of mounted men-at-arms wearing the city livery under heavy serge cloaks. They sat, horses close together, quietly cursing why they had to be here. Cranston gripped the reins of his own horse, his fingers going beneath his cloak to stroke the pommel of his sword. When he first arrived here he’d found it boring, freezing cold, highly uncomfortable. . but now. .? The mist abruptly shifted and parted to reveal ruins which, some claimed, dated back to the days of Caesar. The Lord Coroner blinked, straining both eyes and ears. Had he glimpsed movement? Had he heard the clink of metal? Bayonne also became agitated, as if the old war horse could smell the approach of battle, see the lowered lance, hear the scrape of sword and dagger, the creak of harness and the ominous clatter of war bows being strung and arrows notched. Cranston quietened the destrier, fumbled beneath his cloak and brought out the miraculous wine skin, which never seemed to empty, took a deep gulp of the blood-red claret and sighed in pleasure. He pushed the stopper back even as he wondered what Brother Athelstan, his secretarius and closest friend, would be doing on a morning like this. ‘Probably preaching to his parishioners about the common good,’ Cranston whispered to himself. He breathed out noisily. Athelstan’s parishioners! Were they, or people like them, responsible for bringing him and the rest to wait by a frozen gibbet at a desolate, ice-bound crossroads for a delegation travelling as fast and as furious as they could from Dover? Was an ambush being planned, devised and carried out by the Upright Men?

‘My Lord Coroner.’

Cranston whirled around. The serjeant of the men-at-arms had pushed his horse forward.

‘Sir John, with all due respect, we have been here long enough to recite a rosary.’

‘And we’ll stay here for ten more,’ Cranston snarled, then shook his head in exasperation at his own cutting reply.

‘Come, come,’ Cranston lowered his muffler with his frost-laced gauntlet. ‘We are here,’ he stared at the ruddy-faced serjeant, ‘because His Grace, the self-styled Regent John of Gaunt, uncle of our beloved King, may God bless what hangs both between his ears and between his legs, is arriving with his agents the Meisters Oudernardes and their retinue. They are fresh out of Flanders. As you may know, they will be escorted by Master Thibault, My Lord of Gaunt’s Magister Secretorum, Master of Secrets and his mailed clerk, Lascelles.’

‘Sir John, what are they bringing — treasure?’

‘I don’t know; all I have been told is to wait for them here and escort them to the Tower of London.’

‘But they have enough guards themselves, surely?’

‘I thought that,’ Cranston replied, ‘but they apparently need more.’ Cranston stroked his horse’s neck. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Martin, Sir John. Martin Flyford.’

‘Well, Martin Flyford, what’s the poison in the boil?’ Cranston gestured in the direction of the city. ‘London seethes with discontent. The Great Community of the Realm plots to root up the past and build a New Jerusalem by the Thames; their leaders, the Upright Men, are devising great mischief.’

‘Sir John, they have been doing that for years.’

‘This is different. .’ Cranston broke off at a harsh carrying call from some bird sheltering among the ruins. Was that a marauding jay, he wondered, or something else? Bayonne was certainly nervous, while the other horses had become noticeably agitated.

‘They could be approaching, Sir John. I just wish I knew why we are really here?’

‘Because My Lord of Gaunt wants it that way.’ Cranston turned his horse, flinching at the whipping cold. ‘The Oudernardes are bringing something important, God knows what. Gaunt certainly doesn’t want them to go into London. We are to meet them here and escort them along this lonely track to the Tower.’ Cranston paused at a clink of harness. ‘Let us pray to God and all his saints that they come soon before our backsides freeze to our saddles.’ Cranston felt beneath his cloak and drew out his wine skin. He took a gulp, offered it to the serjeant then took it over to the huddle of men-at-arms, who also gratefully accepted. Mufflers were lowered, chain-mail coifs loosened, eyes gleaming in cold, pinched faces. They shared out the wine, laughing and joking.

‘Look, a lantern!’ one of them cried. Cranston turned in a creak of saddle. Out of the icy mist loomed a hooded rider with a lantern box attached to the rod he carried. Other figures emerged like a line of ghostly monks, cloaks and cowls, hiding everything except for the occasional glint of steel and chain-mail. Cranston touched the hilt of his sword then relaxed as the outriders approached and he glimpsed the stiffened pennants boasting the golden, snarling leopards of England against their vivid blue and blood-red background. The entire cavalcade now broke free of the mist, fifty riders in all, Cranston quickly calculated. He saw the Flemings’ frozen faces shrouded in ermine-lined hoods; the rest were veteran archers from the Tower, master bowmen, who had signed an indenture to serve the Crown after years of fighting in France. Each man was hand-picked and wore the insignia of a chained white hart emblazoned on his cloak. Cranston knew their captain, Rosselyn, both by name and reputation — a hard-eyed slaughterer who’d amassed a petty fortune from ransoms in France. Cranston spurred his horse forward, pushing back his cowl, calling out Rosselyn’s name. The barest courtesies were exchanged. Cranston grasped Rosselyn’s hand and asked how the journey from Dover had been. Rosselyn’s answer was to turn, hawk and spit.

‘Very eloquent,’ Cranston murmured. ‘There was no trouble?’

‘Not yet.’ Rosselyn stared up through the mist. ‘But then His Grace still believes we might be attacked close to London and within bowshot of the Tower. Treason and treachery press in from every side.’

‘What are you guarding?’ Cranston asked. Rosselyn’s light blue, popping eyes never blinked. He just gestured with his head to behind him, where the escort of archers had parted as they relaxed. Cranston glimpsed a woman, he was sure of that, from her lithe form and the way she sat slumped in the saddle, holding her reins. Her head was covered by a deep hood, her face completely masked with only slits for the eyes, nose and mouth. The sumpter pony behind her had an escort of four archers; she herself was flanked either side by three master bowmen. Leather straps had been tied around her waist and wrists; the ends of them were held by her escort.

‘No questions,’ Rosselyn whispered.

‘Therefore no lies,’ Cranston retorted. The coroner pulled up his muffler, lifted his hand and turned his horse into the flurry of snowflakes now beginning to fall. Cranston and Rosselyn rode knee to knee in silence. Cranston kept peering to the right and left; the silence around them was increasingly unsettling.

‘Reminds me of Aix in France,’ Rosselyn murmured. ‘Remember Philip Turbot — Gentleman Jakes as we called him, leader of a gang of freebooters? Well,’ Rosselyn continued, not waiting for a reply, ‘the Jacquerie did for his coven, impaled them all on stakes. Turbot was reduced to robbing a church. He was caught in a snow storm and, so thick did it lie, the Jacquerie couldn’t take him out of the gates to the town gallows.’ Rosselyn indicated with his head to the one they’d just left. ‘So they hanged him from a tavern window bar and buried him in the city ditch.’

‘I remember Turbot,’ Cranston broke in. ‘He claimed to be a warlock. He boasted how he’d climbed to the top of Saint Paul’s steeple, even though it is crammed with holy relics. Turbot said he held a burning glass — this caught the power of the sun and cast its light with such force on a monk walking below that it struck him dead, a bolt more violent than lightening.’

‘Yes, that’s the same Turbot.’ Rosselyn was enjoying himself. ‘Anyway, they thrust his corpse into the city ditch. During the night, however, a company of wolves came, tore him out of his grave and ate him up.’

‘And?’

‘His was the only corpse they devoured to fill their bellies.’

‘Well, no wolves prowl here.’ Cranston made to grasp his wine skin when hunting horns brayed loudly to his left and right. The coroner gazed in surprise as the snowy wasteland all around them seemed to erupt into life. Figures garbed in white rose out of the earth. The first ranks, armed with arbalests and war bows, loosed a volley of hissing shafts while others, armed with pikes, swords and daggers, streamed into the horsemen, deepening and widening the confusion as archers struck by shafts slumped in their saddles or horses, similarly hurt, plunged and reared, striking out with flailing hooves. Cranston drew his own sword, the freezing cold now forgotten as a figure, masked and garbed in white, came at him with a pike. Cranston urged Bayonne forward; his enemy faltered, lowering the pike, and the war horse crashed into him. Cranston turned swiftly, striking with his sword, cleaving his opponent’s head with such force the blood shot up in a fountain. Cranston stared around. The entire cavalcade was now under attack — white-clothed assailants swarmed everywhere. Cranston recognized the tactics. More pikemen were massing to hem the horsemen in while others turned and twisted, striking at leg and fetlock to maim and cripple. The archers’ bows were useless here — they didn’t have the time or space to notch and loose. The main brunt of the attack was against the Flemings in the centre, as if the enemy wished to seize the mysterious prisoner and her pack pony. Cranston urged his horse alongside that of Rosselyn; the captain was busy hacking furiously at an attacker already soaked in blood.

‘For God’s sake,’ Cranston shouted, ‘break off! We are mounted. We cannot be trapped here!’

Rosselyn drew a mailed foot from his stirrup and kicked his assailant away while pulling down his muffler, his face now flecked with bloody frost and sweat.

‘Sweet tits,’ he agreed, staring breathlessly over his shoulder. ‘Sir John, you are right, they will hem us in.’ The fighting was now furious around the centre, a swirling mass of men lunging, stabbing and cutting, churning the ground into a bloody, slushy mess. Rosselyn grabbed his hunting horn and blew three piercing blasts. At first the signal had no effect. Rosselyn repeated it and the cavalcade slowly began to push its way forward out of the throng away from the flailing sword, the jabbing pike and thrusting dagger. City men-at-arms and royal archers massed closer together, using both horse and weapon to break free of their oppressors. Bodies still tumbled out of saddles yet Cranston, who had been virtually ignored as the attack seethed around the centre, breathed a sigh of relief. The cavalcade broke through, horsemen spurred their mounts into a gallop across the frozen waste, arrows and bolts whipped the air, but at last they were completely free. The horde of horsemen thundered forward past the church of All Hallows in the London Wall, on to the main thoroughfare, glistening with ice, which stretched past Aldgate and down to the Tower.

Athelstan, parish priest of St Erconwald’s in Southwark, stared despairingly at his congregation gathered before the rood screen in the sanctuary of their parish church. They were all grouped together, cloistered like angry sparrows, he thought, on this the feast of St Hilary, the thirteenth of January in the year of our Lord 1381. The parish church was freezing cold despite Athelstan’s best efforts. He had brought in braziers crammed with charcoal fiery as the embers of Hell, or so Moleskin the boatman had described them. Nevertheless, the early morning mist had seeped like some wraith under the door, through any gaps in the horn-filled windows and across the ancient paving stones to freeze them all. Athelstan had decided to wait. He would not continue the Mass. He had recited the consecration, offered the Kiss of Peace then the trouble had surfaced — one incident among many. The source of conflict lay with a separate group to Athelstan’s right, close to the sacristy door: Humphrey Warde, his wife Katherine, their big, strapping son Laurence, Margaret, their daughter and little Odo, a mere babe swaddled in thick cloths now held so protectively by his mother. The Wardes were spicers who had moved into a shop in Rickett Lane, a short walk from the parish church. They had, according to Humphrey, withdrawn from the fierce competition in Cheapside to do more prosperous trade in Southwark, raise sufficient revenue then return to Cheapside, or even move out to a city such as Lincoln or Norwich. A simple humdrum tale, until Watkin the dung collector, Pike the ditcher and Ranulf the rat catcher, together with other luminaries of his parish council, had intervened. They only had to level one accusation against the Wardes — traitors! Athelstan took a deep breath; perhaps that issue would have to wait, along with the other business which had surfaced during the Mass. Despite his involvement in the ritual, Athelstan had seen the narrow-faced rat catcher, as slippery as one of the ferrets he carried in his box, dart under the rood screen to whisper heatedly with Watkin and Pike. Some mischief was afoot! Athelstan glanced expectantly at the lovely face of Benedicta the widow woman, but she could only stare pitiably back. Athelstan searched for another ally, a newcomer to the parish — Giles of Sempringham, the anchorite, otherwise called the Hangman of Rochester, a strange, eerie figure garbed completely in black, his straw-coloured hair framing a ghostly white cadaver’s face. The anchorite, who also worked as an itinerant painter, had recently moved from his cell at the Benedictine abbey of St Fulcher-on-Thames to St Erconwald’s. Athelstan had secured the appropriate licences from both his superiors at Blackfriars as well as the Bishop of London. The anchorite, who had monies from his grisly task as the dispenser of royal justice as well as revenue from painting church walls, had financed the construction of a cell here at St Erconwald’s, turning the disused chantry chapel of St Alphege into an anker hold. The anchorite now sat next to Benedicta, one hand clawing his hair, the other sifting Ave beads through his fingers. Athelstan glanced quickly at Pike and Watkin; they had lost some of their stubborn obduracy, openly agitated by Ranulf’s news.

‘Father,’ Crim the altar boy, kneeling on the steps beside him hissed. ‘Father, we should continue the Mass.’

‘Aye, we should!’ Athelstan’s strong declaration rang like a challenge across the sanctuary. He left the altar and strode over to Katherine Warde, holding his hands out for the baby.

‘Please?’ he whispered, ignoring the surprised murmuring from the rest of his parishioners.

Pernel the mad Fleming woman sprang to her feet, her thick, matted hair dyed with brilliant streaks of deep red and green. Ursula the pig woman also got up, as did her great lumbering sow; ears flapping, fleshy flanks quivering, the beast followed her everywhere, even into church. Both women were staring at their parish priest as if he had introduced some new rite into the Mass.

‘Please?’ Athelstan smiled at Katherine. ‘I need Odo now.’ He turned. ‘Ursula, Pernel, don’t get agitated, sit down.’ The mother handed the baby over. Athelstan hugged the warm little body, kissed him on the brow, then went over to confront his parishioners. ‘Our Mass will now continue,’ he declared loudly. Then, holding up the baby instead of the host and chalice as expected, Athelstan intoned, ‘Behold the Lamb of God, behold Him who takes away the sins of the world.’

‘He’s not the Lamb of God,’ Pike the ditcher’s sour-faced wife Imelda rasped, eyes glittering with malice, mouth twisted in scorn.

‘Yes, he is!’ Athelstan replied fiercely. ‘Behold the Lamb of God. Behold Him who takes away the sins of the world! If you,’ he continued hotly, ‘cannot see Christ in this little child, then do not look for him under the appearances of bread and wine. You are wasting your time, my time and, more importantly, God’s time. So get out of my church!’ Ursula and Pernel immediately sat down, as awestruck as the rest at the fierce temper of their usually serene parish priest. This little friar with his olive skin, dark, gentle eyes and eccentric ways now throbbed with anger. ‘If you cannot share the kiss of peace with your neighbour,’ Athelstan handed the baby back, thanking the mother with his eyes, ‘you are not welcome here.’ Athelstan moved back to the altar and stood there, his back to his parishioners. He heard movement. A stool scraped, a leaning rod clattered against the wall. When he turned round, Benedicta had risen and was sharing the kiss of peace with the Wardes. Others followed, including Ursula’s sow. The pig sniffed at the baby and then decided to bolt through the rood screen, lumbering down the nave to the front door, now flung open, the great bulk of Sir John Cranston, Lord Coroner of London, blocking the light. Athelstan murmured a prayer of thanks. Cranston slammed the door shut and strode up the nave, kicking aside the great sow, who always regarded the coroner as a close friend. Behind Cranston padded another self-appointed friend, Bonaventure, Athelstan’s sturdy, one-eyed tom cat, who always seemed to know when Mass was finishing and possible morsels were available from visiting parishioners.

‘Lord,’ Athelstan murmured, ‘give me patience!’ He nodded at Cranston, who stood just inside the rood screen, and continued with the Mass. He paused before the final blessing to announce that the parish council would not meet that morning but possibly tonight, once Mauger the bell clerk and council secretary had pealed the hour of Vespers. Athelstan then sketched the final blessing, declared the Mass over and swept into the sacristy. He divested, swiftly aware of Cranston standing behind him.

‘Good morrow, Sir John,’ he declared without turning. ‘You walk into my church like the Angel of the Second Coming. I am needed, yes? We are needed?’ Athelstan corrected himself. He turned and smiled at the white, bewhiskered face of the coroner, who just stared back, his great blue eyes full of sadness.

‘Happy feast day, Sir John. Saint Hilary bless us all. What is the matter?’

‘You are.’ Cranston clasped the friar’s outstretched hand. ‘I sense you are upset, Brother. The business of the Wardes, that new family? I received your message. I have whispered to the sheriffs and their underlings but they know little about them. I also approached Magister Thibault, Master of My Lord of Gaunt’s secret matters. He neither said “yea or nay”.’ Cranston clapped his gauntleted hands together. ‘The Great Community of the Realm plots; its leaders the Upright Men prepare for what they call the Day of the Great Slaughter; they promise a new Jerusalem here in Southwark and elsewhere. The storm is coming, Athelstan, mark my words. Some of your parishioners are deep in the councils of the Upright Men.’ Cranston shrugged. ‘But, in the end, it will be your hangman who will be the busiest of them all. He will be kicking them from the scaffold in their hundreds.’ Cranston sighed noisily. ‘You’re needed.’ He beckoned. ‘Master Thibault wants you, so collect your cloak and writing satchel.’ Cranston gestured where the friar had laid these over a small trestle table. ‘Tell the widow woman and the rest to look after your church. A bloody business awaits us.’

‘What, Sir John?’ Athelstan’s stomach lurched. He recollected how most of his parishioners had attended Mass except for Ranulf the rat catcher, who’d burst in so unexpectedly.

‘We will talk as we walk,’ the coroner smiled, ‘or at least try to.’

They re-entered the deserted sanctuary. Benedicta was lighting a taper in the Lady Chapel. Athelstan quickly whispered to her that she and Crim look after the church and the priest’s house, for God only knew at what hour he would return.

‘Be careful, Father.’ The widow woman’s lovely face creased with worry. Her anxious eyes held those of this celibate priest whom she loved so much, she had to be shriven at another church in the city. After all, how could she confess her most secret thoughts to the man who was the very cause and root of such thoughts?

‘Be careful, Athelstan, please.’

‘What, Benedicta. .’

She grasped his hand in her mittened fingers. ‘Father?’ She looked over her shoulder at Cranston standing further down the church, admiring Huddle the painter’s most recent offering, ably assisted by the Anchorite, a vivid warning against pride.

‘Benedicta?’

‘Father, I have heard rumours. They have trapped some Upright Men in the Roundhoop, a tavern near the Tower. .’

‘Brother Athelstan!’ Cranston was marching towards the door. The friar squeezed Benedicta’s hand, raised his eyes heavenwards and hurried after him. Cranston was standing on the top step outside the church, glaring across at Watkin, Pike, Ranulf and others huddled together like the conspirators they were.

‘Keep well away from the Roundhoop!’ Cranston roared. ‘I do not want to see any of you fine fellows across the bridge. Do you understand?’ Watkin detached himself from the group as if to challenge the coroner, who went down the steps, hand resting on the hilt of his sword.

‘Watkin!’ Athelstan warned, coming out of the church, shifting the strap of his writing satchel more comfortably around his neck.

‘Watkin,’ he repeated, ‘go into God’s Acre. Make sure Godbless has enough to keep himself and Thaddeus warm and fed.’ Athelstan forced a smile at the thought of that omnivorous goat ever going hungry. ‘Merrylegs!’ Athelstan beckoned at the pie-shop owner. ‘I will need two of your pies by the time I return. Huddle, you are being given money to finish the Fall of Pride. Ask the anchorite for his advice.’ Athelstan walked down the steps, calling each parishioner by name, giving them either work or advice. The group broke up. Athelstan crossed himself in gratitude. He must not lose his temper. He closed his eyes and whispered the prayer he always did after the Eucharist.

‘Jesus Lord, welcome thou me

In form of bread as I see thee

Jesus, for thy holy name,

Shield me today from sin and shame.’

He opened his eyes. Cranston, despite his bulk and swagger, had come quietly up beside him and was now staring at him curiously.

‘Sir John, I am ready.’

They left the enclosure, going up the alleyway to the main lane leading down to London Bridge. Flaxwith, Cranston’s principal bailiff, together with his mastiff, which Athelstan secretly considered to have the ugliest face in London after its owner, were waiting, swaddled in their heavy cloaks. Flaxwith, along with other members of Cranston’s comitatus, had cornered a relic-seller, who bleatingly introduced himself as ‘John of Burgundy’, more popularly known as ‘Bearded John’. This counterfeit man owned a little fosser of blue and black satin holding what he proclaimed to be the most holy relics, including a finger of one of the Holy Innocents and a bone of one of the Eleven Thousand Virgin Martyrs of Cologne, as well as a piece of rock from where God met Moses. The relic-seller, eyes bright in his chapped face, babbled like a babe. Cranston heard his patter then thrust the fosser back into the man’s trembling hands.

‘John of Burgundy, be gone,’ the coroner whispered, pushing him away. ‘Today, we hunt greater prey.’

‘I did hear. .’ Bearded John babbled.

‘Yes, yes, I’m sure you did.’ Cranston thrust him out of the way and continued on. Athelstan had to hurry to keep up. He felt like reminding the coroner how he would like to know what was happening but the noise and bustle of the streets made that impossible. The snow clouds had broken and a weak sun had brought out the crowds. For the last few days the grey, icy frostiness had stifled trade and imprisoned people in their chambers and garrets. Now, even this mild change in the weather had enticed them out. Everybody wanted to trade, sale, buy, beg or steal, not to mention visit the cook shops, wine booths, alehouses and taverns. An enterprising leech had set up shop close to Sweet Apple Court, a name Athelstan considered to be the most blatant lie in Southwark as the enclosure was as filthy and stinking as any piggery. Nevertheless, in spite of the reeking odours, the leech had gathered a crowd, assuring all and sundry that if they adjourned to his chambers in nearby Firkin alley, he would examine their urine and let a little blood. Afterwards he would provide them with his miraculous elixir, the cheapest sort containing cloves, nutmeg, mace and similar ingredients; the more expensive, ‘for the more discerning’, would be made up of ambergris, juniper and white frankincense. Athelstan, bemused, shook his head, constantly surprised at the sheer gullibility of the human heart. He walked on cautiously. The ground underfoot was frozen, the rutted ice covering the filthy slops and congealed mud. Athelstan murmured a prayer for safety to St Christopher as he dodged sumpter ponies, high-wheeled carts and lumbering oxen. A stiff river breeze blew a cauldron of smells and odours, a rich stew of fish, spices, fried meat and freshly baked bread along with the stench of animal dung and human waste. The ever pervasive, bitter tang of saltpetre made Athelstan gag. The saltpetre was thrown along the lanes to mask rank odours till the lay stalls, crammed with frozen refuse, were emptied by the dung carts. The scavengers who manned these were now busying to clear the mess left to rot during the previous week’s snow storms. Beadles patrolled the streets, screaming at householders not to empty jakes’ pots. One beadle had been rewarded for his efforts by receiving the entire contents of two night jars over him, and now he and his colleagues were battering at the door of the citizen responsible, determined on punishment.

The dead were also being buried. The break in the weather meant requiems could be sung, graves hacked out of the iron-hard ground and mourners allowed to provide their beloved departed with the appropriate religious farewell. Coffins bobbed on shoulders or bounced in hand carts as mourners, preceded by a priest pattering the psalms, led funeral processions to this chapel or that cemetery amidst the fiery glow of candles, lantern boxes and torches. Gusts of incense sweetened the air. The throng of citizens divided to allow the dead to pass before the crowds closed again, surging in every direction. Athelstan could only murmur his own prayers and keep his hands, freezing cold despite the woollen mittens, tightly on his writing satchel. The tribe of filchers, nips and foists were out, eager for plunder, hunting the swinging purse or loosely hung wallet. Cranston was recognized. Insults were hurled when the ‘parishioners of the devil’, as the coroner called them, fled up alleyways and runnels. At last they approached the bridge, though this was fast becoming a battleground involving a group of scavengers clearing the dirt. They had clashed with street hawkers, hucksters and chapmen who insisted on taking up their position with their baskets of eggs, butter, cheese, brushwood and heather ‘fresh from the countryside’. A group of fish wives from Billingsgate, their thick leather aprons encrusted with blood, had joined the fray equally determined to sell their eel tarts, fish pies, oysters and mussels. The air was riven with curses and obscenities hurled backwards and forwards. The tumult had blocked the approach to the bridge. Cranston barked out an order. Flaxwith brought out a hunting horn from beneath his cloak and blew strident blasts before bellowing at the top of his voice that everyone was to keep the King’s peace and step aside for the Lord High Coroner. The tumult subsided. As the brawlers dispersed into the shadow of the overhanging houses, Cranston swept on. Once he had passed, the tumult began again. Athelstan heaved a sigh of relief as he glimpsed the bridge’s high gates and towers as well as the cornices, sills and steeple of the Priory of St Mary Overy. They had to pause for a while as an execution party made its way down to the gallows — three wolfsheads who’d escaped from sanctuary at the priory and been wounded during the affray. Each had been summarily tried, condemned and loaded into wheelbarrows, commonly used to collect dung, and were now being taken from the Compter Clink to the riverside gallows. Athelstan blessed each of the groaning men then passed on to the bridge through the cavernous gate, its curving rim spiked with the boiled heads of traitors.

They made their way along the narrow lane between the houses and shops, which rose above them, leaning over to block out the sky. Beneath them echoed the thunderous roar of the river as it crashed against the starlings protecting the pillars of the bridge. Athelstan was sure the bridge was moving; as always, he tried to distract himself while keeping a wary eye on the ground beneath. A cluster of eel stalls stood at the near end of the thoroughfare and the discarded skins made the lane more slippery than ice. Athelstan glanced to his left and right. He was always fascinated by the apparent wealth displayed by the stalls and shops along the bridge. Some of the costliest items in London could be purchased here. Cloths and fabrics from Constance, Tournai and Rouen. Canvas from Westphalia and silver thread from Cologne were sold alongside amber and bone beads, ivory combs, silk girdles, brass rings, leather hats and hand mirrors of steel, crystal and jasper. Apprentice boys loudly proclaimed the virtues of buckram, silk, sarcanet, lawn and dyed wool. Jewellers and goldsmiths offered diamond necklaces, buckles and girdles, precious stone paternosters, mazer cups, silver gilt goblets and salt cellars, as well as spoons of every precious kind studded with gems or embroidered with gold or silver tracery. Another stall, manned by three clerks, ‘learned in the halls, schools and Inns of Court,’ offered to write or copy letters, deeds, leases, memoranda or bills of exchange. Between life-size statues of St Catherine the Virgin and St Nicholas of Colenso, the haberdashers of the hat, haberdashers of the small wares and ironmongers offered kerchiefs embroidered with religious devices, pyxes or kissing boxes, night-time laces, pepper mills, girdles and pouches, the latter adorned and embroidered with silver clasps. At Becket’s shrine in the centre of the bridge, merchants met bankers before going into the chapel either to seal documents at the altar or pass money over. All this was recorded by the chapel’s clerks in a leather-bound book of debts kept in an iron chest beneath the relic stone; this made repayment a matter of faith not just business. In the stocks next to the chapel, a vintner, found guilty of mixing cobbler’s wax with the dregs of his wine, was sitting with his legs firmly clasped. The disgraced merchant was being forced to drink a draught of his own adulterated beverage. A market beadle slowly emptied another jug over the unfortunate man’s head while a second beadle loudly proclaimed, ‘That Richard Pemrose, vintner, could do no further trade in wine or any other commodity for a year and a day’. Beside Pemrose sat an imprisoned cook’s apprentice from a nearby pie stall. He had sold pies and patties stuffed with the flesh of hen, goose, duck, lark and fish, but he’d also plucked at the costly gowns of passers-by and so, as the notice around his neck proclaimed, ‘damaged their clothes with hands dirtied and fouled’. Cranston paused to take a drink from his wine skin. He offered this to Athlestan, who refused even as he shook off the grasp of a chapman eager to sell him a trinket.

‘It will change now, little friar.’ Cranston gestured to the near-end of the bridge. ‘The hustle and bustle will fade and,’ he nodded at the spikes above the gate leading into the city, ‘there will be fresh offerings on them tomorrow morning.’

They left the bridge, turning right up the lane leading to St Magnus Church. Men-at-arms had sealed the streets. Chains had been pulled across. Carts closed over the entrance to the twisting alleys and lanes. Knights in chain-mail stood by their war horses. Mounted hobelars, swords drawn, clustered nearby. The air reeked of sweat, leather and horse. Cranston had to leave Flaxwith and the bailiffs at one of the barriers; only he and Athelstan were allowed up the lane to where the Roundhoop stood behind its high curtain wall. Athelstan had visited the tavern before, a strange building, circular in shape, of harsh grey stone with a sloping red-tiled roof. Once it had been a barbican or weapons’ tower until some enterprising ale-master had bought it and reopened its great doors as a hostelry. The main gates to the tavern hung loose, and on either side along the wall stood men-at-arms and archers. Cranston recognized Rossleyn; now and again the captain would edge forward, peer round the open gate then hastily withdraw. On the other side of the gates clustered a group of men, heads together in heated discussion. These broke off as Cranston and Athelstan approached. The friar immediately recognized Thibault, Master of Secrets, the senior clerk of John of Gaunt’s chancery. A born plotter, an inveterate schemer, Thibault dabbled in all the dark, sinister affairs which flowed around his master. Thibault was also a cleric who nursed secret ambitions of a bishopric. Cranston had mocked this, claiming Thibault would make a fine shepherd as long as his flock produced a rich fleece. ‘A man who would merrily give you the shirt off your back,’ the coroner had added. Thibault’s looks belied such barbs: small and plump, his round, smiling shaven face glistened with oil and good living. A fastidious man, Thibault’s corn-coloured hair was neatly cropped in strict accordance with Canon Law to show his tonsure. Master Thibault dressed ever so modestly in a dark fustian cotheardie over a white cambric shirt and Lincoln-green leggings pushed into the finest leather boots from Cordova. Thibault’s blue eyes creased in good humour as he clasped Athelstan’s hand and welcomed him to what he termed ‘this delicate affair’. Other introductions were made. Athelstan nodded at Lascelles, Thibault’s man-at-arms dressed completely in black leather, his dark hair swept back and tied in a queue. Lascelles always reminded Athelstan of a raven with his sallow-pitted skin, pointed face and a nose as sharp as a hook above thin, bloodless lips. A strange soul, Athelstan considered, Lascelles was Thibault’s dagger man and enjoyed the most unsavoury reputation. The Flemings were only known to Athelstan by common rumour. The red-faced Oudernardes, father and son, were Gaunt’s agents in Ghent — powerful merchants, they looked the part with their heavy-jowled features, luxuriant beards and moustaches. Both were dressed soberly although costly in beaver hats, ermine-lined mantles and cloaks of the purest wool. Lettenhove, their man at arms, was a hardbitten veteran, his narrow face and close-cropped head marked with old wounds and cuts. Cornelius, their secretary, was small and round as a dumpling with narrow, blackcurrant eyes which almost disappeared into the folds of his pasty white face. Cornelius’ hand shake was soft and limp, his voice lisping like a girl’s, yet Athelstan caught his shifty, haughty look; how Cornelius’ lips pursed in a smirk as he surveyed Athelstan from head to toe. He then turned away, nodding to himself as if he’d weighed the Dominican in the balance and found him wanting. Athelstan bit back his temper. Cranston coughed and clapped his hands.

‘No movement?’ the coroner barked louder than he intended. ‘Rosselyn, what is happening here?’ The captain of archers on the other side of the entrance edged forward; he stooped and raced across the entrance to the tavern yard. He’d hardly reached the other side when an arrow whipped through the air to clatter further down the lane.

‘In God’s name!’ Athelstan exclaimed.

‘Peer round the gate, Brother,’ Cranston urged, ‘but stoop, be quick!’

Athelstan did so. The cobbled stable yard glistened with bloody, melted slush. The outhouses on either side, the storerooms, smithy and stables looked deserted, though Athelstan heard the whinnying of horses in their stalls. He edged further and gasped. Two corpses hung by their necks from the bars of an upper window, its shutters flung back. The men just dangled there, hands tied behind their backs, booted feet swaying, necks twisted, heads slightly back, faces frozen in a horrid death. Closer to the main tavern door two huge mastiffs were sprawled in a pool of freezing blood; arrow shafts pierced their throats and flanks. One of the shutters in the grey-rounded wall moved. Athelstan drew back as another shaft sped through the air.

‘Sir John, Master Thibault,’ Athelstan demanded, ‘what is going on? Why have I been brought here?’

‘They have asked for you.’ Cranston took a swig from his wine skin.

‘Who have? Sir John, please, what is happening?’ Though remembering Ranulf’s interruption of Mass, Athelstan began to suspect the worst. Cranston leaned against the wall, the others grouped around him. Athelstan sensed there was something very wrong. The coroner would not look him in the eye. He was about to speak when a shout echoed from the Roundhoop.

‘We have glimpsed a black and white robe. Is Athelstan the Dominican here?’

‘Yes!’ Athelstan shouted back before anyone could stop him. ‘Yes, I am. What do you want with me?’

‘To talk.’

Athelstan turned to Cranston. ‘Why,’ he demanded fiercely, ‘am I here?’

‘Four days ago,’ Thibault answered, ‘we were attacked on our way to the Tower.’

‘Yes, I’d heard about that — the entire city did.’

‘Our assailants were despatched by the Upright Men, leaders of the so-called “Great Community of the Realm”.’

‘And?’

‘We heard,’ Cranston replied, gesturing at Thibault, ‘how some of the Upright Men were meeting at the Roundhoop. Minehost here, Simon Goodmayes, is known to be sympathetic to their cause.’

‘In other words,’ Athelstan replied abruptly, ‘Master Simon does not want his tavern burnt to the ground when the Day of Judgement arrives; that is what they call it, yes?’

‘True.’ Cranston smiled at the little friar so uncharacteristically angry. ‘Master Thibault has spies among the Upright Men; they alerted us to this meeting.’

‘We surrounded the Roundhoop,’ Thibault declared. ‘The tavern stands behind a square stone wall with a garden at the back. We now have it sealed. Believe me, Brother, escape is impossible.’

‘The Upright Men realized they’d been betrayed,’ Cranston declared. ‘They hanged two of the tavern servants and slaughtered Master Simon’s mastiffs. Everyone else has fled, faster than rabbits under the hawk. The Upright Men now have Master Simon and a few customers held to ransom.’

‘How many Upright Men are there?’ Athelstan asked.

‘Perhaps ten in all,’ Thibault replied. ‘We arrived and they acted swiftly. Doors were barred; two of the servants apparently tried to escape and were summarily hanged. The mastiffs turned nasty; they realized their master was in danger, so they were killed.’

‘And why are you here, sirs?’ Athelstan turned to the two Flemings.

‘Because, Brother,’ Pieter Oudernarde lowered the muffler from around his mouth, ‘we believe these same outlaws organized the attack on us four days ago. We are certain our possessions were stolen.’ The Fleming caught Thibault’s eye; he coughed and pulled a face. ‘We would also like to see justice done.’

‘And your property returned?’

‘Yes, Brother,’ Cornelius piped up, his reedy voice uncomfortable on the ear. ‘To see our property — certain items — returned.’

‘And yet I ask again,’ Athelstan insisted, ‘why am I here? What do you want me to do?’

‘The Upright Men want to negotiate,’ Cranston murmured, holding the friar’s gaze, warning him with his eyes that all was not what it appeared to be.

‘To negotiate? Why me?’

‘You are well known, Brother,’ Cranston again replied, gesturing at the others to remain silent.

‘Will he talk?’ a voice bellowed from the tavern.

‘What do they want?’

‘Safe passage, probably by river.’

‘And if not?’

‘They will kill the hostages and fight to the death!’ Cranston declared brusquely. ‘Look at the Roundhoop, Brother — built of stone like a castle tower. We cannot burn them out.’

Athelstan ignored the deep unease tugging at his soul. Cranston could say more but this was neither the time nor the place.

‘I will go in,’ Athelstan said wearily. ‘Let us hear what they have to say.’ A bunch of evergreen was brought from a nearby garden lashed to a pole. Athelstan threw this into the gateway.

‘Pax et Bonum,’ he called. ‘I will speak.’

‘Tu solus frater,’ a voice sang out in Latin. ‘You alone, Brother.’ Athelstan, fingering the wooden cross on the cord around his neck, stepped around the gateway. He walked slowly across the cobbles, quietly murmuring the prayers for the dead, trying not to think of himself but the two corpses dangling by their necks, young men hurled violently into eternity with neither prayer nor blessing. The great wooden doors of the tavern swung open though no one appeared.

‘Enter!’ a voice called. Athelstan paused.

‘Enter!’

‘Cut down the hanged men,’ Athelstan retorted. ‘Cut them down now. Let me pray over them. God knows their souls may not have left their bodies. Judgement could still await.’

‘Enter!’ the voice screamed. Athelstan took a deep breath. He knelt down on the cobbles, head bowed, ignoring the repeated shouts to enter. Silence fell. A window opened and the two dangling corpses were cut from their ropes to tumble on to the ground. Ignoring the faces frozen in hideous death, Athelstan administered the last rites to both victims. He blessed their corpses, rose to his feet and walked up the steps into the circular tap room, a murky place of shifting shadows. All the windows were shuttered, the only light thrown by squat tallow candles and narrow lantern horns. A figure loomed out of the gloom, head covered by a pointed hood, a red mask hiding his face, his heavy, draping cloak hung loose to reveal a war belt with sword and dagger sheaths. Other shapes stepped into the pools of light, dressed all the same, sinister phantasms of the night, armed and menacing. Athelstan stared round. Minehost Simon lay badly wounded, along with two servants. A Friar of the Sack and a fat, painted whore, a bushy orange wig almost hiding her face, sat like terrified children on a bench against the wall. They gazed owl-eyed at Athelstan, except for the whore, who put her face in her hands and began to sob.

‘Well,’ the friar asked, ‘what now?’

‘We trust you, Athelstan. The earthworms say you are not one of us yet you are sympathetic.’ The voice of the masked figure confronting him scarcely rose above a whisper.

‘The earthworms?’ Athelstan retorted. ‘You mean my poor parishioners who, according to you, will spin Fortune’s wheel and change the power of Heaven.’ Athelstan shook his head. ‘Gaunt will burn this city before he allows that to happen.’

‘We shall burn it for him — an easy enough task.’

‘Gallows and gibbets are just as easily erected.’

The masked figure laughed softly.

‘Why did you hang those two poor unfortunates — aren’t they earthworms too?’

‘They tried to escape; that can only mean they were either spies or intent on raising the alarm. They had to be punished; a warning to the rest.’

Athelstan stared around the gloomy tap room. He glimpsed about six Upright Men — others, he reasoned, must be in the galleries above. He also noticed their war belts and quivers, the arbalests, maces and clubs and, in his secret dread, Athelstan sensed this would end in bloodshed.

‘So what must I do now?’ Athelstan tried to keep his voice calm.

‘We are near the river.’ The Upright Man went on to demand, ‘We want one of the royal war barges from the Tower. We-’ He abruptly paused. Athelstan heard a whooshing sound followed by a scream in the galleries above; something hot and fiery smashed into the shutters of the Roundhoop. The Upright Man drew his sword. Athelstan gestured at the hostages.

‘Run!’ he screamed. ‘Run!’ He hastened over and dragged the friar and the whore to their feet. She kept her face down, her voice squeaky, muttering curses in the patois of the London slums. Athelstan pushed them both towards the door. He glanced swiftly around; more fiery missiles smashed into the wooden shutters. Smoke billowed down the stairs. Athelstan hurried towards the door. An Upright Man emerged out of the murk, pulling the red mask from his bearded face. He gazed wild-eyed at the friar and raised his sword threateningly, moving sideways as Athelstan tried to avoid him. More missiles smashed into the walls. Thick smoke curled. The air was shattered by screams and yells. The Upright Man lowered his sword, an almost beseeching look in his eyes.

‘I didn’t know!’ Athelstan yelled at him. The whore close to the door collapsed to her knees, sobbing in terror.

‘I didn’t know,’ Athelstan repeated.

The young man let his sword arm droop then abruptly lurched forward, mouth open. He tried to speak but gagged on his words. He staggered towards Athelstan before collapsing to the floor; the yard-long shaft had pierced him deep in the back between his shoulder blades. The stricken man rolled to one side, stretching his head back as if searching for someone. Athelstan knelt beside him as royal archers and men-at-arms surged through the door, knocking aside Athelstan and the other hostages in their rush to engage the Upright Men. The smoke was thickening, reducing individuals to mere shapes. More soldiers charged in. Swords and daggers flashed in the light. Blood snaked across the floor, trickling over the green supple rushes. The friar and the whore, on all fours, crept out on to the steps. Athelstan was tempted to follow but he could still feel the Upright Man’s body warm against his shaking hand. He turned the man over on to his side; he was dying, the fluttering eyes dulling, blood bubbling out of nose and mouth.

‘Thank you,’ Athelstan whispered. ‘You did not strike. God be my witness, I did not know the attack would be launched.’

‘Father, shrive me of all my sins.’ The dying man tried to speak but the blood gathering at the back of his throat choked him. Athelstan whispered the words of absolution even as he watched the life light die in the stricken man’s eyes. He gave a gasp summoning up his last energy, what Aquinas called the ‘last leap of the soul’ before it left the body. He grasped Athelstan’s hand.

‘Your name?’ the friar asked gently.

‘No name.’ The dying man sighed. ‘Tell my beloved to continue gleaning.’

‘Gleaning?’ Athelstan leaned over the man. ‘What do you mean?’

The Upright Man tried to rise and twist his head as if searching for someone or something. ‘Tell her to glean; I won’t see her.’ His grasp on Athelstan’s hand tightened and relaxed. He sighed out his soul, body trembling; he coughed blood then lay still. Athelstan sketched a blessing and rose to his feet. The attack was now deep in the tavern, the Upright Men retreating into the upper galleries. The tap room was like a battlefield across which echoed screams and yells, the strident screech and scrape of sword on sword yet the struggling shapes, the fire licking at the shutters and the noise of battle seemed eerily distant as if muffled by a sound like that of pounding waves in a storm. Athelstan stared around, trying to make sense of the confusion. The smoke was now thinning, drifting out through the main door. The Friar of the Sack and his whore had disappeared. Minehost Simon and his two servants lay stretched out on the cobbles, corpses stiffening, their throats slit, a mess of blood congealing at neck and chest. Athelstan went out and administered the last rites but he fumbled and forgot the words. He paused, took a deep breath and began again. He whispered the words of forgiveness and that final petition to the Lords of Light to go out and greet all these souls: ‘Lest they fall into the power of the enemy.’ He felt a hand on his shoulder. Cranston stood there, holding his chancery satchel. Athelstan had never seen the coroner look so sad; his ruddy face was pale and those glaring blue eyes dimmed. Even the glorious white whiskers seemed to droop.

‘By Mary and the Mass,’ Cranston breathed. ‘Athelstan, I swear, I did not realize this was going to happen and yet, as you know,’ he blinked, ‘from the moment we arrived I smelt treachery. I was asked to accompany the Flemings around the wall to the back of the tavern. When I got there, the mangonels released their first shots, fiery, pitch-coated bundles of bracken and old cloth. Only then did I realize what was about to take place. I hastened back but the assault had already begun. Athelstan. .’ The Dominican simply shrugged off the coroner’s hand, grasped his chancery satchel and strode over to the gate where Thibault stood, legs apart, hands on his hips, head slightly back as he watched his archers drag out the corpses from the Roundhoop. The Master of Secrets narrowed his eyes, lips twisted in a smirk as the Dominican confronted him.

‘Brother, I gave them no promises except one!’ Thibault held up a hand. ‘They wanted to speak to you and so they did. They were traitors, rebels, taken in arms plotting against the Crown. They were murderers and ravagers. Now they are dead and their heads will provide further decoration for London Bridge.’ He leaned forward, the smirk replaced by false concern. ‘Brother?’

‘Once a scorpion asked a wolf to take him across a fast-flowing river. The wolf,’ Athelstan held Thibault’s gaze, ‘at first refused. “You will sting me and we shall both die”. The scorpion denied this, promising all would be well so the wolf allowed the scorpion to stand on his head as he braved the waters.’

‘And?’ Thibault drew his head back, glancing over his shoulder at his archers now kicking and abusing the corpses.

‘The scorpion stung the wolf, who protested, saying the scorpion had given him his word and now they would both die, so why had he stung him? You know the scorpion’s response?’

‘No, Brother, I don’t.’

‘The scorpion replied, “Because it is in my nature”. Good day, Master Thibault.’ Athelstan stepped around him and, clutching his chancery satchel, strode down the lane, ignoring Thibault’s cry of ‘Very good, very good!’ as well as Cranston’s shouts to wait awhile. Athelstan walked on through the cordon of men-at-arms now fighting to keep back the gathering crowd, whose mood was turning ugly. Athelstan glimpsed faces he recognized: the pious fraud, the Sanctus Man, with his tray of religious artefacts; Mudfog, a member of Moleskins’ Guild of St Peter; and Shrimp and Castoff, two members of the Fisher of Men’s company, that strange individual who made his living by gathering corpses from the Thames. Athelstan did not pause but passed on, taking the path down to London Bridge. His mind was in turmoil, angry at what he had witnessed yet relieved to be free though still deeply anxious about the doings of some of his parishioners. Would they also be trapped to be cut down or hanged? He recalled the dying Upright Man’s last words about asking a woman to glean. What did that mean? What had that unfortunate man been looking for?