Paul Doherty - The Midnight Man

The clerk whistled into the darkness and the archers brought a sack forward. Cutwolf shook out the long white Carmelite robes. He and Bolingbrok swiftly dressed, both robes had rents at the side so swords and daggers could be drawn in an instant. They pulled up the cowls, had a murmured conversation with the captain and left the nave. Four of the archers followed at a discreet distance. Higden went to move. ‘Stay!’ the Captain of the Archers bellowed. ‘Only the Carmelites may move.’ Stephen watched the line of archers bring up their bows — ghostly hooded figures, their winged death merely a whisper away.

‘Pray, Stephen.’ Anselm touched the novice lightly on the arm and went to kneel on the sanctuary steps. Stephen walked through that ominous line of bowmen to the ruins of the corpse door. He stared out across the night-shrouded cemetery. So much had happened there, and now a gathering was imminent.

‘Dark night. A host of shadows cluster,’ a voice whispered. ‘They will snare the sin-drenched souls in their dizziness. Hem them in their own terror-filled madness.’ Figures merged out of the blackness twisted in deformed infirmity. A faint rottenness teased Stephen’s nostrils. ‘Corruption lays siege,’ a voice hissed, and the visions faded. Far out in the cemetery a light appeared, small but brilliantly white. Then abruptly a baby laughed cheerily. ‘Christ’s tiny voice!’ The very air breathed the words. ‘The Divine Child.’

‘Blessed be he,’ another voice thundered, ‘who prepares my arms for war and my hands for battle.’

‘The shield wall still holds.’ The first voice spoke again. ‘But will the armour fail, the heroes fall?’

Stephen broke from his reverie. Clear on the night air echoed the soul-chilling clash of steel. The ringing scrape of sword on sword, the vicious clatter of dagger blades. Shouts and cries trailed then lapsed into silence. Stephen stared in the direction of the lychgate. A light appeared — the hungry flames of a cresset torch, the murmur of voices, the groans and cries of wounded men. Cutwolf and Bolingbrok strode out of the night; behind them archers dragged two men garbed in black leather. Both were wounded: one had a bubbling cut to the side of his neck while the right leg of the second man simply trailed as a piece of useless, twisted flesh. Hoods and masks had been removed to reveal hard, lean, unshaven faces. Stephen stared closely. He was sure both men had, at some time, visited The Unicorn. He hurriedly stepped aside as the cortege swept into the church. Cutwolf was brutal. Seizing the prisoner with the broken leg and, despite his screams and protests, he forced him to kneel, yanking back his head, pressing the cutting edge of his dagger against the prisoner’s pulsing throat.

‘Who were you to kill?’

The man shook his head, crying to himself.

‘Who?’

‘Two Carmelites,’ the man blurted out. ‘We were told they would leave the church and take the lanes back to White Friars sometime after the Vespers bell sounded. We watched the church. We saw you leave so we withdrew and waited.’

‘For the surprise of your life,’ Bolingbrok jibed. ‘And your orders? Come, man, let your tongue chatter.’

‘We received a message.’

‘From whom?’

‘The tavern master of The Gates of Hell.’

‘The Southwark tavern?’

‘The same.’

‘And?’

‘We were told to visit a haberdasher’s shop in the Mercery. To look for a message in a leather writing case, embroidered with the arms of Castile.’

‘And payment?’

‘To visit the church of Saint Frideswide as the bell for Terce sounded tomorrow, and look for six silver pieces in a pouch pushed into the old leper-squint in the wall.’

Cutwolf, ignoring the man’s protests, pulled him to his feet and thrust him forward so the other prisoner had to catch him. Higden, Almaric and Gascelyn, subdued and watchful, clustered together.

‘Who?’ Anselm strode to stand in front of them. ‘I ask you as the only people who knew that two Carmelites were here at this time, are now with us in this church, so who told these assassins?’

Cutwolf broke the brooding silence. He drew his sword with a rasp and held it up, fingers clutching the cross-hilt. ‘I, Edmund Langley, commonly known as Cutwolf, clerk in the Secret Chancery of England, faithful retainer of Edward King of England, Scotland and France, by the power given to me, adjudge you, Sir William Higden, Squire Gascelyn, Curate Almaric and,’ Cutwolf pointed at the two moaning prisoners, ‘all your adherents, to be traitors taken in arms against the Crown.’

‘We demand a fair trial,’ Higden spluttered, face pale as he realized the full impact of what was happening.

‘Taken in arms against the King.’ Cutwolf stepped back. ‘You murdered my master, a royal clerk. You pillaged the King’s treasure. Your coven attacked the King’s loyal servants. You murdered then revelled in your victims’ blood. You have committed heinous treason, sacrilege and arson.’

‘By what right?’ Higden took a step forward.

‘I am a cleric,’ Almaric bleated.

‘By this.’ Cutwolf, still holding the sword up, dug into his wallet and handed Stephen a small script. ‘Read it aloud, boy, read it so all can hear.’

Stephen, hands shaking, unrolled the stiff, cream-coloured parchment.

‘Out loud!’ Cutwolf repeated.

‘What the bearer of this seal has done, he has done for the Crown, the realm and Holy Mother Church. All officers and loyal subjects of the Crown, on their duty of allegiance and on pain of treason, must give the bearer of this seal and all his work full sustenance and support.’

‘And?’ Cutwolf demanded. ‘What else?’

‘Given under the secret seal at our Palace of Sheen, on the fourth of May in the forty-seventh year of our reign, Edward the King.’

‘And the seals?’

‘Two,’ Stephen replied. ‘The signet seal of the King.’ Stephen peered at the generous blob of purple wax. ‘And that of the Secret Chancery at Westminster.’

‘Taken in arms.’ Cutwolf’s words were full of menace. ‘Adjudged traitors, sentenced to death, punishment immediate.’ He stepped forward. ‘Archers,’ he lifted a gauntleted hand. ‘Notch!’

Stephen shivered at the ominous rattle. Higden fell to his knees. Almaric turned, looking wildly for escape. Gascelyn drew his dagger.

‘Loose!’

The air thrummed with a sombre twang, the hiss of feathered death as the arrow shafts, one volley after another, sped into the exposed group. The two failed assassins simply toppled over. Almaric, his back turned, was hit three times. One shaft pierced his neck, bursting through his gullet. Gascelyn was struck in both face and chest. Higden, caught on all fours, rolled in agony as the shafts pierced deep into his side and belly.

Stephen glanced at Anselm. The exorcist’s face was as white as snow, his lips crusted with blood. He could only sketch a cross in the air. The condemned lay sprawled. Gascelyn and Higden still jerked. Cutwolf, sword sheathed, misericorde dagger in his hand, moved from corpse to corpse, slitting throats as cleanly as a woman would clip a flower head. Once finished he plucked the commission out of Stephen’s icy fingers, winked at the novice and walked away. ‘Do not grieve for them,’ he called out over his shoulder. ‘Hell has them and God’s creation is richer for it.’ Cutwolf walked back, tears glittering in his hard eyes. ‘I loved Sir Miles,’ he whispered, ‘more than David loved Jonathan. A good man, Stephen. In my eyes, God’s own child. These villains brought their death on themselves. God will judge them.’

‘What now?’ Anselm moved back to sit wearily on the sanctuary steps.

‘We will burn the corpses,’ Cutwolf replied, spittle wetting his dry, cracked lips. ‘We will have it rumoured abroad how poor Sir William and his loyal servants were trapped in another hideous blaze at Saint Michael’s. The King will know the truth. He will seize all of Higden’s wealth, along with this treasure hoard. He will embrace me as his friend and order chantry priests to sing Masses every day for the repose of Sir Miles’ soul. And you, Brother?’