Paul Doherty - The House of Shadows

‘Well, Athelstan.’

Cranston stood in the tavern doorway, beckoning him over. Athelstan hurried across, grateful for the sweet warmth of the inn. Rolles was busy in the kitchen, but the coroner was most insistent on meeting the knights, and a short while later, Cranston sat at the head of the long walnut table in the solar, Master Rolles, Brother Malachi and the four knights ranged down either side. Athelstan sat at the far end. He brought his writing tray out, uncapped the ink horn and had a sharp quill ready.

‘I must protest.’ Sir Thomas Davenport spoke up. ‘My Lord Coroner, we intended to visit Trinity, guests of the Aldermen at the Guildhall.’

‘I couldn’t care if the Lord God Almighty was your host,’ Cranston snapped. ‘I have more questions for you.’

Davenport pulled a sullen face. Sir Reginald Branson, with his long grey hair tied in a queue, made to leave, scraping back his chair, his black and white cloak draped over one arm.

‘If you leave, sir, I’ll have you arrested for murder.’ Cranston pounded the table with a ham-like fist. ‘And the same goes for you, Master Rolles, busy as you claim, even if you had Mary and Joseph in the stable outside, though, knowing you, you wouldn’t even give them that!’

Cranston’s anger stilled all protest.

‘Master Rolles, you hire girls from Mother Veritable?’

‘I’ve told you.’ The taverner’s fat face glistened with sweat; his piggy eyes screwed up in annoyance, he breathed noisily through his nose and gestured at the tapestry. ‘A letter left there, a silver coin with the name of the girl wanted.’ He drummed his fingers on the tabletop. ‘Sometimes that’s just left for me, other times I put it there for Mother Veritable’s messenger-’

‘How many coins?’ Athelstan interrupted.

‘Whatever the arrangement, it’s a deposit of two coins; one for me, one for Mother Veritable.’

‘Isn’t that against the City ordnances?’ Athelstan asked.

‘Tell him, Sir John.’

‘Southwark lies beyond the jurisdiction of the Corporation. As long as Rolles doesn’t actually house the girls in question, he is breaking no law. So, these wenches simply arrive and their customers are waiting?’

‘Yes,’ Rolles agreed. ‘The note will designate where they are to come, to the tap room or to a chamber.’

‘Or a hay barn?’ Athelstan asked.

‘Where is your note,’ Cranston asked, ‘inviting Beatrice and Clarice?’

‘I understand Mother Veritable has destroyed it.’

‘You saw them arrive?’

‘Yes,’ Rolles agreed. ‘On the night of the Great Ratting they came into the tap room. They were to meet their customer once that was over, about the second hour after midnight. There are hour candles in the tap room. The girls wouldn’t miss such an assignation. I saw them there until just before the fight, when the Judas Man killed Toadflax thinking he was the Misericord.’

‘Why are we here?’ Sir Laurence Broomhill, slightly shorter than the rest, leaned over the table and glared down at Athelstan.

‘You know full well. Would any of you here,’ Cranston stared around, ‘take an oath that they have never lain with either or both of those slain women?’

Sir Laurence sat back.

‘Answer the question.’ Cranston pounded the table. ‘You come up to London to celebrate what you call the “old days”, when you gathered here as Crusaders under the banner of Lord Peter of Cyprus. Every year you return. You lodge here and have Mass said at St Erconwald’s. You also visit the brothel, and always ask for Clarice or Beatrice.’

‘Is this true?’ Brother Malachi asked weakly. ‘You still consort with whores?’

‘You cannot come to Mass,’ Athelstan spoke up. ‘You must not take the Eucharist, until you stop such sin, confess and receive absolution.’

The knights were clearly taken aback and stunned into silence.

‘In fact,’ Athelstan continued, ‘I do not want you in my church. You have committed fornication.’

‘More importantly for me,’ Cranston remarked, ‘one, two or all of you may have committed murder. Where were you on the night these girls were killed?’

‘We left the tap room.’ Sir Maurice Clinton spoke up. ‘We left after the Great Ratting. We returned to our chambers.’

‘All of you?’ Cranston asked.

‘Tell the truth,’ Brother Malachi said. ‘Go on, Sir Laurence.’

The knight rested his elbows on the table, running his fingers through his thinning hair.

‘We all returned to our chambers. Brother Malachi came to mine, alarmed by the sound from the fight below. He wanted to know if I would share a cup of wine with him, but I’d gone back downstairs to see what the fray was all about.’

‘And so?’ Athelstan asked. ‘What did you do, Brother Malachi?’

‘I went downstairs, to see what had caused the tumult. By then the man was dead, his corpse laid out in the tap room. I went to take the night air in the stable yard. I saw Sir Stephen come back, his cloak all about him. He appeared agitated.’ The Benedictine glanced quickly around the table. ‘I do not want to betray my comrades. But we must tell Sir John what happened in the tap room.’

‘Well?’ the coroner demanded.

‘During the Great Ratting,’ Sir Maurice replied, ‘Chandler parted company with us. I saw him arguing with the two whores.’

‘You mean he solicited them?’

Sir Maurice nodded. ‘They would have nothing to do with him,’ he continued. ‘They were laughing, pushing him away. He came back sweating, cursing under his breath.’

‘Oh Domine, miserere! Lord have mercy,’ Sir Laurence whispered.

Cranston spread his hands on the table.

‘Is it possible,’ Davenport asked, ‘that Sir Stephen was insulted by those two whores? He may have invited them here but they refused him because they had another assignation.’

‘I must confess,’ Sir Maurice broke in, ‘we have been through Sir Stephen’s possessions. He owned a small arbalest, which is now missing.’

Athelstan scrutinised these knights of Kent, powerful lords, men who owned rich estates, warriors of the Cross, who lived secret lives, coming up to London — Athelstan curbed his anger — to roister and carouse. They’d sin secretly in the dark of night then swagger into his church to eat and drink the body and blood of Christ. Oh yes, Athelstan reflected, Sir Stephen, indeed any of these men, would kill a whore in the blink of an eye, out of rage, frustration, or a sense that their famous honour had been besmirched! He stared down the table at Sir Jack, who was also lost in thought; he recalled that the coroner had told him how knights like these, lords of the land, were flinty-eyed, hard of heart and grasping. Little wonder the poor peasants in the shires round London seethed with discontent. Men whispered how there would soon be a rising, led by the Great Community of the Realm. Cranston claimed the revolt would begin in Kent, no surprise with narrow-souled hypocrites like these lording it in the shire.

‘Did any of you go to that barn?’ Cranston asked.

‘What would I have to do with whores?’ The Benedictine raised his right hand and displayed his stunted fingers. ‘The work of a scimitar, Sir John. I could not handle a crossbow. Ask any of these good men here.’ Malachi’s voice was rich with sarcasm. ‘I am more a danger to myself with such a weapon than to anyone else.’

‘And you, Master Rolles. Where were you?’

The taverner got to his feet and went to the door. He shouted for Tobias who served as cook and cask-man and returned to his chair. A short while later a young man with spiked red hair, a leather apron wrapped about him, came into the solar.

‘Tobias, tell the gentlemen here where I was after the Great Ratting.’