Paul Doherty - House of the Red Slayer

He slithered on the icy cobbles and leaned against the wooden frame of a house, grinning.

‘Athelstan should be here helping,’ he murmured. ‘If not with headless corpses, then at least by keeping me steady on the ice.’

He walked on up Cheapside. A dark shape slid from the shadows to meet him. Cranston half drew his dagger.

‘Sir John, for the love of Christ!’

Cranston peered closer at the raw-boned face of the one-legged beggar who always sold trinkets from his rickety stall on the corner of Milk Street.

‘Not in bed, Leif? Looking for a lady, are we?’

‘Sir John, I’ve been robbed!’

‘See the sheriff!’

‘Sir John, I have no money and no food.’

‘Then stay in bed!’

Leif steadied himself against the wall. ‘I paid no rent so I lost my garret,’ he wailed.

‘Well, go and beg at St Bartholomew’s!’ Cranston barked back, and trudged on. He heard Leif hopping behind him.

‘Sir John, help me.’

‘Bugger off, Leif.’

‘Thank you, Sir John,’ the beggar answered as coins tinkled to the ground. Leif knew enough about the fat coroner to understand Sir John hated to be seen giving charity.

Cranston stopped before his own house and looked up at the candlelit windows. Leif nearly crashed into him and Cranston shrugged him off. What is the matter with Maude? he wondered. He had always considered marriage similar to dipping one’s hand into a bag of eels — it depended on luck what you drew out. Yet he had been so fortunate. He adored Maude from the mousey hair of her head to the soles of her tiny feet.

As he mused a figure suddenly emerged from the alleyway which ran alongside Cranston’s house.

‘By the sod!’ he exclaimed. ‘Doesn’t anyone in this benighted city sleep?’

The fellow approached and Cranston recognised the livery of the Lord Mayor.

‘By the sod,’ he repeated, ‘more trouble!’

The young pursuivant, teeth chattering, hoarsely delivered his message.

‘Sir John, the Lord Mayor and his sheriffs wish to see you now at the Guildhall.’

‘Go to hell!’

‘Thank you, Sir John. The Lord Mayor said your reply would be something like that. Shall I wait for you?’ The young man clapped his hands together. ‘Sir John, I am cold.’

Still bellowing ‘By the sod!’ Cranston banged on the door of his house. A thin-faced maid opened it. Behind her stood Maude, now fully dressed, her sweet face tear-stained. Sir John grinned at her to hide his own disquiet.

‘Lady wife, I am off to the Guildhall — but not before I break fast.’ He dragged the young pursuivant in with him. ‘He’ll eat too. He looks as if he needs it.’

Cranston spun on his heel, went back outside and re-entered, dragging in Leif by the scruff of his neck. ‘This idle bugger will also be joining us. After which, find him a job. He will be spending Yuletide here.’ He tapped his broad girth. ‘For all of us, hot oatmeal and spiced cakes!’ The coroner sniffed the air. ‘And some of that white manchet, freshly baked.’ He looked slyly at his wife. ‘And claret, hot and spiced. Then tell the groom I need a horse!’ He grinned broadly, but despite his bluster Cranston noticed how pale and ill his wife looked. He glanced away. Oh God! he thought. Am I to lose Maude? He tossed off his cloak and strode past his wife, touching her gently on the shoulder as he passed.

Athelstan was distributing communion, placing the thin white wafers on the tongues of his parishioners. Crim held the silver plate under their chins to catch any crumbs which might fall. Most of the parish council had turned up, some wandering in when Mass was half over.

The friar was about to return to the altar when he heard a tapping on the outside wall of the far aisle. Of course! He had forgotten the lepers, two unfortunates whom he’d allowed to shelter in the musty charnel house in the cemetery. Athelstan provided them with food and drink and a bowl of water infused with mulberry to wash in, but never once had he glimpsed their scabrous white faces, though from his clothes one was definitely a male. He wished he could do more for them but Canon Law was most insistent — a leper was not allowed to take communion with the rest of the congregation but could only receive it through the leper squint, a small hole in the wall of the church.

Crim remembered his duties and, picking up a thin twig of ash, handed it to the friar who placed a host on the end and pushed it through the leper squint. He repeated the action, whispered a prayer, and went back to finish the Mass.

Afterwards Athelstan disrobed in the sacristy, closing his ears to the crashing sounds from the nave as Watkin the dung-collector rearranged the benches for the meeting of the parish council. Athelstan knelt on his prie dieu, asked for guidance, and hoped to God his parishioners would overlook the dreadful events happening outside.

As soon as he stepped into the nave, he knew his prayers had been fruitless. Watkin was sitting in pride of place, the other members on benches on either side of him. Crim had placed Athelstan’s chair out of the sanctuary ready for him and, as he took it, Athelstan caught Watkin’s self-important look, the ominous flickering of the eyes and the mouth pursed as if on the brink of announcing something very important.

Ursula the pig woman had joined them, bringing her large fat sow into church with her in spite of the protests of the rest. The creature waddled around grunting with pleasure. Athelstan was sure the annoying beast was grinning at him. He did not object to its presence. Better here than outside. Ursula was a garrulous but a kindly old woman. Nevertheless the friar hid a blind hatred for her large, fat-bellied sow which periodically plundered his garden of any vegetables he tried to plant there.

Athelstan said a prayer to the Holy Ghost and leaned back in his chair.

‘Brothers and sisters,’ he began, ‘welcome to this meeting on our holiday feast of St Lucy.’ He ignored Watkin’s eye. ‘We have certain matters to discuss.’ He smiled at Benedicta then noticed with alarm how Watkin’s wife was glaring at Cecily the courtesan. A mutual antipathy existed between these two women, Watkin’s wife in the past loudly wondering why it was necessary for her husband to confer so often with Cecily on the cleaning of the church. Huddle the painter stared vacantly at a blank wall, probably dreaming of the mural he would like to put there if Athelstan gave him the monies.

Most of the parish business was a long litany of mundane items. Pike the ditcher’s daughter wished to marry Amisias the fuller’s eldest boy. The great Blood Book was consulted to ensure there were no lines of consanguinity. Athelstan was pleased to announce there were not and matters turned to the approaching Yuletide: the Ceremony of the Star which would take place in the church, the timing of the three Masses for Christmas Day, the non-payment of burial dues, and the children using the holy water stoup as a drinking fountain. Tab the tinker offered to fashion new candlesticks, two large ones, fronted with lions. Gamelyn the clerk volunteered to sing a pleasant carol at the end of each Mass at Yuletide. Athelstan agreed to a mummers’ play in the nave on St Stephen’s Day, and some discussion was held about who would play the role of the boy bishop at Childermass, the feast of the Holy Innocents, on the twenty-eighth of December.

Athelstan, however, noticed despairingly how Watkin just slumped on his bench, glaring impatiently as he clawed his codpiece and shuffled his muddy boots. Benedicta caught Athelstan’s concern and gazed anxiously at this man she loved but could not attain because he was an ordained priest. At last Athelstan ran out of things to say.

‘Well, Watkin,’ he commented drily. ‘You have a matter of great urgency?’