Paul Doherty - The Relic Murders

'I have a horror of hanging,' Cerberus insisted. 'Do this favour for me. Please!' 'And in return?' 'I'll tell you what I know. Oh, one thing more, Master Shallot, send my parents a letter.' I just stared in disbelief.

'Please!' Cerberus insisted, 'To John and Christina Doddshall of the Silver Wyvern on the High Pavement in Nottingham. They think I am a clerk with a good benefice in a nobleman's household. Tell them I died of the plague or the sweating sickness, that I was honoured and loved. Oh, and one thing more.' I closed my eyes. 'Before I die, I want a priest to shrive me. Promise me that!'

What could I do? The poor bastard was going to die and, but for the love of God and the favour of my master Benjamin, I could have well ended up as a member of a gang like Charon's. I gave him my word. 'Now,' I began. 'The Orb of Charlemagne?'

'Lord Charon, may he rot in hell,' Cerberus replied, 'bought the Orb from the Schlachter.' ‘I have heard of that name before. Who is he?'

'No one knows,' Cerberus replied. 'He is one of London's most skilful assassins. If he accepts a task, he always carries it out himself: poison, the garrotte, the dagger, the sword.' 'Was he responsible for the deaths at Malevel?'

Cerberus closed his eyes. I gently pushed up his head and forced more of the coarse wine into his mouth. Cerberus blew on his lips, coughing as the wine stung his throat.

‘I heard what you said,' he gasped. 'It's possible but, how he could do it by himself is a mystery.' 'How did the Schlachter tell Charon he had the Orb?'

'He sent us a message,' Cerberus replied. 'Told us to meet him in a copse to the north of the hospital of St Mary of Bethlehem. Only Charon and myself were to go. He named his price: two thousand pounds in gold. Charon and I were to come just after dark as the hospital bell rang for Compline. There was to be no trickery or he'd take our lives as well as the money.' Cerberus closed his eyes.

I thought he had lost consciousness but then he stirred and looked up at me.

'This was about two or three nights ago. Charon was curious about the deaths at Malevel. After all, that was our handiwork, the murder of the old lady, the stripping of the manor. Anyway, he brought the gold in barrels on a sumpter pony. We stood at the edge of the copse and, when the Compline bell sounded we entered the trees. On a log lying in the centre of the clearing was a small wine tun. We went across and took the lid off: the Orb was inside. We took it, left the gold and rode back into London.' 'And you never saw the Schlachter?' Cerberus gasped and shook his head.

'No one ever does. Lord Charon had hired him before.' He grinned. 'Certain rivals who had to disappear when Charon could prove he was elsewhere.' 'How would you hire him?' I asked. 'There must be a way?'

'Isn't it strange?' Cerberus gasped. 'Very few people claim to know the Schlachter yet it's remarkable how many people use his services. If you want to hire an assassin in London,' he continued, 'you make it known in ale-houses or amongst the market sellers in St Paul's churchyard. However, for the Schlachter, go to Scribes' Corner, a small alcove just within the door of St Paul's. Seek out a clerk called Richard Notley. He's a lean-faced knave. Tell him you wish to hire a slaughterer and say where you reside. The Schlachter will make himself known.' 'And the Orb?' I asked.

'Lord Charon sold it to the Papal Envoys. It was over and done with in a matter of hours. Charon thought it was most amusing.' 'Did he know it was a replica?' I asked.

'Neither he nor I gave a pig's turd!' Cerberus scoffed. 'The Italians paid good silver and gold. Charon was content.' He licked his chapped lips. 'That's all I know. Shallot,' he gasped. 'As God is my witness. Now, be a gentle boy, pour the rest of that wine between my lips and, if you don't keep your word, damn you to hell!' I fed him the wine and left. I took Benjamin aside and briefly described what Cerberus had told me. Benjamin immediately ordered a friar to be sent for and told the torturers to desist from any further questioning.

We went out and sat on a bench at the top of the steps whilst, across the green, the remaining members of Charon's gang were summarily despatched. A ghoulsome sight: four gallows, their long poles forming a square. I saw what Henry's troops did when they crushed the Northern rebellion under Robert Aske. There were corpses hanging on every gibbet and on every tree along the Great North Road. But, on Tower Green, with the sun growing strong and birds whirling against the blue sky, it was macabre to see this square of hanged men. Most hung silent, only a few still twitched and jerked in their death throes. At last Cerberus was dragged out: he was carried across on a door and laid before the judges. They asked him how he was to plead. He told them to go to Hell so they sentenced him to hang but Benjamin intervened.

'Master Cerberus,' he began. 'Master Cerberus was most cooperative in telling us about these outlaws' depredations. He is not to hang. His head is to be severed from his body.'

Isn't life strange? Cerberus cackled with laughter when he heard this and began to bless my name as if I had given him a king's pardon. Kempe and the judges objected but Benjamin was obdurate. 'He is not to hang!'

A squabble would have broken out but Egremont got to his feet, clapping his gloved hands. He said something to one of his retainers. The man ran across and brought back a small log from a pile heaped at the far end of the green.

'If he is not to hang,' Egremont declared, 'justice will still be done.' He rapped out another order. Two of his liveried servants rolled Cerberus off the door and positioned him so his neck lay against the log. Egremont took off his cloak, drew his sword and positioned himself carefully. He brought the sword up and, in one clean sweep, took Cerberus's head sheer off at the neck.

Of course, I had walked away, hand to my mouth. I don't like the sight of blood, even if it's not my own. By the time I returned, archers from the garrison had placed Cerberus's body and severed head on the door and were taking them away to be buried in a lime pit in a desolate part of the Tower.

Egremont looked like a man who has done a good day's work. He accepted Kempe's offer of refreshment but first walked round the scaffold, carefully inspecting the corpses as if he was suspicious that one of them might still be alive. Eventually he conferred with Kempe, then Benjamin, Cornelius and myself followed them across the green and up into the great hail.

'A satisfactory morning's work,' Kempe announced as he sat at the top of the great table waving us to the benches on either side. 'But the last man,' he continued, 'the one who didn't want to hang: what did he have to say to you? What did he confess?' My master's boot tapped my leg. 'Nothing much,' I replied. 'Come, come.' Egremont beat his wine cup against the table. 'Did he mention the Orb?' Cornelius snapped.

'He said that the outlaws and wolfsheads had heard about the theft but nothing else.' Cornelius's eyes slid away. He knew that I was lying.

'Surely,' my master intervened. 'Surely, Lord Egremont, you, too, have made careful searches?'

'Oh yes, we have.' Lord Egremont took his gloves off and played with the small, leather tassel on one of them. 'Rumours spring as thick as weeds.' His voice took on a harsh tone. 'Such as?' I asked. Egremont didn't even look at me.

'Rumours that the Orb is in the hands of the French or the Papal Envoys. His Imperial Highness Charles V will not be pleased.'

'My Lord Theodosius, your command of the English tongue is admirable,' Benjamin commented.

'I studied in the Halls of Cambridge,' Egremont replied. 'The quadrivium, the trivium, logic and metaphysics.' 'And you, Master Cornelius?' I asked.

'For a while I lived in England,' Cornelius retorted. 'Many years ago I was apprenticed to a cloth merchant, a Hanse at the Steelyard.'