Paul Doherty - The Midnight Man

Stephen worked hard from daybreak until noon. Once the Angelus bell sounded, Alice would take Stephen into what she called her ‘secret bower in the greensward where they could sit like Robin and Marion in Sherwood’. In truth, that part of the tavern garden was overgrown, a mass of tangled bushes and climbing sturdy flowers. A former owner had built the bower by twisting saplings together and allowing an array of wild roses to overgrow it. Inside stood a high turf seat and a rickety old table for pots of flowers. The only fly in the ointment, as Alice observed, was her baby sister, Marisa. Alice’s mother had died giving birth to her and Master Robert believed the life force of two souls was trapped in that little body. Marisa was a vivacious handful: six to seven years of age, she was a bundle of energy with a rosy face framed by yellow curls and a constant gap-toothed grin. She was, as Stephen came to realize, a sprite in all her ways. Marisa needed very little sleep — merry as a robin, she rose early to seek him out. From the start, Marisa had decided that if her sister liked Stephen, so would she and she acted accordingly. Where Stephen and Alice went, Marisa always followed, their noonday meetings being no exception.

Alice tried to ignore her younger sister, more concerned about the dire events in Dowgate. ‘Margotta Sumerhull and I would often come here after the Angelus,’ Alice declared as she made herself more comfortable, placing the linen napkins containing cold meats and fresh bread on the table. She took the tankards of ale from Stephen and placed them down, turning to grasp his hand firmly, her loving eyes now solemn. She would always lean forward and kiss him roundly on the mouth, then draw back. Stephen sometimes wondered if Alice was slightly fey; he had never met a young woman like her — demure but direct.

‘We always met here,’ Alice continued, parcelling out the food. ‘We would discuss meeting our perfect gentle knight as the troubadours say we should. Well,’ she pushed a piece of bread between Stephen’s lips, ‘I have met mine. I took to you, Master Stephen, as soon as I met you in the street with Brother Anselm.’ She smiled. ‘You looked so innocent, so trusting, despite all the commotion at the church. You are the young man I decided I should marry.’

Stephen gulped what he had eaten. ‘But I am a novice,’ he replied, ‘entrusted to the Carmelite order.’

‘But you have only taken simple vows, not solemn ones,’ Alice declared blithely. ‘I have checked that. Brother Gilbert — you know, the Benedictine who sells us his produce from the orchard at Westminster?’ She didn’t wait for Stephen’s reply. ‘Well, I have asked him. He explained the difference. He knows about you and Brother Anselm. He says you visited Westminster.’ Alice cut a portion of meat, neatly diced it with a sharp, curved knife, picked up the pieces and popped them into his mouth. ‘You see visions, don’t you? Are you seeing them now?’

‘No!’ Stephen exclaimed with a fervour which surprised even himself. ‘No, I am not — not since I came here.’ He swallowed the diced meat and grinned. ‘Perhaps you frightened them off?’

‘I probably have.’ Alice chewed on her bread, watching him curiously. ‘I heard about what they discovered at Rishanger’s house. Did you know he used to come here? A weasel-faced, hard-hearted rogue. I never liked him.’ Alice put down the piece of manchet loaf. ‘God knows,’ her eyes filled with tears, ‘one of those may have been Margotta Sumerhull. Tell me,’ and she’d revert to her usual litany of questions, which he tried to answer as best he could.

Stephen came to realize that Brother Anselm had left him at The Unicorn for many reasons. The exorcist himself had disappeared, lost in his own business. Stephen began to sense that Anselm was not only trying to determine his vocation but also learn what was happening along the needle-thin runnels and alleyways of the Parish of St Michael’s, Candlewick. Stephen remained vigilant. The deaths of Bardolph and his wife, the opening of the graves, the rumours about hauntings, had alarmed everyone. People were now glad that Sir William Higden had decided to keep the church under close ward. Many argued that the church should be closed completely. Sir William should pull down the entire edifice, clear the cemetery, fill the charnel house and begin a new building. The dark rites of the Midnight Man and his coven were common gossip, as well as the horrid finds at Rishanger’s house. Lists of the names of young women who had disappeared were hastily drawn up in this alehouse, tavern or cook shop and passed from lip to lip. Alice, however, was only interested in one name: her bosom friend, Margotta Sumerhull. She pestered Stephen, who could only answer that all they had found was a tangle of bones. Nevertheless, he promised he would ask Anselm and Sir Miles if they could offer further help. Secretly, Stephen wondered more about Edith Swan-neck, Bardolph’s mistress. Stephen, from what he had learned from his father, knew that her corpse would not have decayed completely, so where was she?

At times, although immersed in the joys of The Unicorn and Alice’s loving presence, Stephen openly fretted about the apparent disappearance of both Anselm and Beauchamp. Alice, in their daily meetings in her ‘secret bower’, would often question Stephen about his master. Did he have secret powers? Could he see the spirits of the departed? Stephen, sworn to silence on such matters by Anselm, could only answer evasively, so Alice would move on to Beauchamp. Stephen had also heard rumours about the royal clerk. How he lived in apparent splendour in his own elegant mansion in Ferrier Lane. ‘A man of great discretion’ was how Alice described Sir Miles, who sometimes supped at The Unicorn. Rumour had it that he was a ladies’ man, yet he was most reluctant to entertain at home and more inclined to visit this tavern or that, constantly escorted by his henchman Cutwolf. Rumour babbled about that enigmatic royal clerk’s private life, though it was more of a case of much suspected but nothing proved. At times Stephen was relieved to be distracted by the young Marisa, who regarded his daily meetings with Alice in their bower as part of a delicious game. The little girl would creep through the garden, or be there hiding already, only betraying herself by a flash of colour or her irresistible giggle. Alice would rise and go searching until she caught her young sister, dragging her out of her hiding place, trying not to laugh at the gap-toothed grin before sending her packing back into the tavern. Marisa, however, also regarded Stephen as hers and, when her sister was not looking, would grasp his hand, jumping up and down, begging to be taken out to this stall or that.

Cutwolf appeared. He, too, took lodgings at The Unicorn, a narrow, low chamber near the stables. At first he kept to himself, busy with his master’s affairs. Cutwolf could give Stephen little news about Anselm, who had apparently disappeared into the muniment room at the Tower while Beauchamp was absent on Crown matters, though exactly what was never discussed. During the second week of Cutwolf’s stay at The Unicorn, as Minehost and his servants prepared for some May-time celebrations, Cutwolf became more sociable. He took to joining Master Robert and the tavern servants in the taproom after the usual customers had left. In the glowing light from a roaring fire and the shafts of flame from candles and tapers, Cutwolf would regale them all with stories about London’s Hades, the dreadful underworld thronged by a host of dark but colourful characters: Melisaunde, the arch mistress of wicked wenches and Duke Jacob Hildebrod, a monstrously fat old man with one gleaming eye in the centre of his forehead. How Duke Jacob ruled what was commonly called ‘The Shire of the Lords of the Huff’, which included all the naps, foists, coneycatchers, cozeners and forgers of London. How this lord of hell could whistle up a blizzard of swords and cudgels as well as a legion of hideous hags who rode on broomsticks. The rifflers and the rufflers from the dank, pig-licked cobbles of Southwark and Smithfield were also his retainers. .