Paul Doherty - The Straw Men

‘Do you know anything fresh?’ Cranston jibed, ‘or are we here to marvel at your wisdom and knowledge? You have power, Duke Ezra, but so do I.’

‘Something else is being planned,’ the gang leader retorted quickly, stung by Cranston’s jibe. ‘What, Sir John, I do not know. There is chatter about a gathering at the Tower, or around it.’ Duke Ezra sipped from his goblet. ‘Tell Gaunt to leave there,’ he continued. ‘The Upright Men will play him hard and fast, make it appear as if he is besieged, driven from his power, frightened of even being in his palace of the Savoy. Also tell him,’ Ezra paused, ‘that despite all his precautions, the secret prisoner, or so the gossip runs, poses a direct threat to him.’

Athelstan leaned forward. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Nothing, for the moment.’

The friar stared at this notorious wolfshead. For a few heartbeats he caught fear in Ezra’s face and voice, as if this self-proclaimed Duke knew how far he could go. Gaunt’s mysterious prisoner seemed to mark the limit. So who was she? Athelstan wondered. If Gaunt thought Ezra would meddle with his prisoner he’d send troops into Whitefriars and hang this outlaw leader from his gatehouse.

‘I will give His Grace the Regent your kind advice.’ Cranston toasted Ezra with his goblet. ‘But you know why we are here. I want to meet the Herald of Hades. If there is mischief afoot, he’ll have snouted it out as swiftly as a hungry hog with a truffle.’

Duke Ezra stared at the blood brimming on the samite cloth.

‘Sir John,’ he did not lift his eyes, ‘the Herald of Hades — you want to speak to him?’ He raised a be-ringed hand, the precious finger stones dazzling in the light. ‘So you shall. But not now.’ Ezra grinned. ‘He has been very busy on my behalf across the Narrow Seas in Ghent. You may meet him the day after tomorrow, on one condition.’ He drew a small scroll from the cuff of his velvet-laced jerkin and held it up. A figure stepped out of the darkness and took this round to Cranston. The coroner unrolled it. Athelstan glanced quickly at the list of names under the heading of ‘Newgate’.

‘My beloveds, Sir John, all intended for the Elms gibbet at Smithfield. I know you have pardons prepared. I want my beloveds back.’

Cranston, fingers to his lips, studied the names. ‘Not these two.’ He tapped the parchment. ‘Crail and Layburn ravished an innocent maid and throttled her; they must hang.’

‘Really, Sir John?’

‘They will hang,’ Cranston declared defiantly, pushing back his chair. ‘I viewed her corpse. Barely twelve summers old, she was. I have seen a cat treat a rat with more respect. God wants them for judgement.’

‘No mercy?’

‘None!’ Cranston shouted. ‘But these three others, the Plungers. .’

‘Plungers?’ Athelstan queried.

‘Professional cozeners,’ Cranston whispered. ‘One pretends to fall in the Thames, the second pretends to rescue him, and the third organizes a collection for both the so-called victim and his saviour.’ He tapped the parchment. ‘These three,’ he raised his voice, ‘have allegedly dipped into every stream, river and brook in and around London. I know this unholy trinity; they’ve had the gristle in their ears pierced and an “F” branded on their shoulders, yet they still keep plunging.’

‘Old comrades,’ Duke Ezra declared mournfully, ‘Sir John, they truly are my beloveds.’

‘All three will be pardoned.’ Cranston rose to his feet. ‘On one condition: I never see their ugly faces this side of the Thames again.’

‘Then go in peace.’ Duke Ezra also rose. ‘The Lord be with you, Brother Athelstan, Sir John.’

‘And with your spirit too,’ Athelstan quipped back.

‘You will arrange it personally, Sir John, the morning after tomorrow as the execution cart leaves Newgate?’

‘I’ll be there. And the Herald of Hades?’

‘Sir John, he will await you. .’

In the ruined nave of the derelict church of St Dismas, which stood in a thick clump of trees to the north of the old city wall, Simon Grindcobbe and the other leaders of the Upright Men had gathered their cell drawn from Massingham, Maldon, and other villages of south Essex. This was a safe, deserted place. Once a prosperous village, the great pestilence had swept through with its scythe and reduced both church and village to a haunt of ghosts. Outside the wooden crosses and stone memorials in God’s Acre had crumbled and fallen. Only the towering memorial stone on the top of the great burial pit bore witness to the church’s former history as well as the horror that had silenced it forever. Grindcobbe, Tyler and Straw now sat cross-legged behind the preacher John Ball as he knelt before the crumbling altar and intoned their chant.

‘Nations in their greatness, he struck.’

‘For his love endures forever.’ The voices of the fifty fighters rolled back like a crashing wave.

‘Kings in their splendour he slew.’

‘For his love endures forever.’

‘Sihon, King of the Amorites.’

‘For his love endures forever.’ The response grew even stronger.

‘On the earthworms their land he bestowed.’

‘For his love endures forever.’

‘Kings in their splendour he slew.’

‘For his love endures forever.’

‘Og, the King of Bashan.’

‘For his love endures forever.’

‘On the earthworms their land he bestowed.’

‘For his love endures forever.’

‘Kings in their splendour he slew.’

‘For his love endures forever.’

‘Edward, tyrant of England.’

‘For his love endures forever.’

‘Gaunt the usurper.’

‘For his love endures forever.’

Grindcobbe turned. The fighters, heads and shoulders cowled and mantled in tarred leather, faces hidden behind black mesh masks, were now in a trance, chanting the responses to John Ball’s hymn of destruction. Grindcobbe rose and walked up the crumbling sanctuary steps into the darkened sacristy. ‘Are you there, Basilisk?’ he called out.

‘I am.’

Grindcobbe peered through the murk; the far outside door, hanging off its latch, swayed in the breeze. ‘You have met our spy in Gaunt’s household? You must be surprised?’

‘No surprise, Master Grindcobbe. This entire city seems up for sale.’

Grindcobbe laughed softly. ‘When you decide,’ he added, ‘deal with him. He has served his purpose. He only feeds us morsels, what he wants to. One day Gaunt will catch him out. The torturers will tug him apart to discover what he knows. More importantly, to protect himself, he might kill you. Anyway,’ he continued, ‘tomorrow, just after the Angelus bell, let all chaos break out. Have the postern gate loosened. You have wreaked great damage. More must be done.’

‘Who is that prisoner?’ The basilisk’s voice was scarcely above a whisper.

‘Rumour abounds,’ Grindcobbe replied evasively. ‘Once we seize her, we shall have the truth about Gaunt’s shame. We will topple him off his high throne. We will make the people wonder. We will present him as a spectacle, a prince who can’t even rule the Tower. Remember, once the Angelus bell has tolled.’

‘I shall remember,’ came the whisper. The sacristy door swung open and the basilisk slipped like a ghost into the night.

‘There is an assassin on the loose who swept through my parish like some winged demon. This murderer annihilated an entire family.’ Athelstan gripped the lectern in the chapel of St Peter ad Vincula. The friar had returned to his lodgings in the Garden Tower late the previous day; he’d immediately demanded an audience with Magister Thibault, where Cranston had passed on Duke Ezra’s warnings. Thibault had heard them out, tapping fingers against the arm of his chair before informing them that he would reflect on all this and meet them on the morrow.