Candle Flame (16 page)

‘No, I shall do that,’ Athelstan retorted. ‘The law of sanctuary is quite explicit. No officer, and that includes Sir John, can approach the fugitive in sanctuary after the felon has grasped the horn of the altar. I, as the priest, however—’ Athelstan broke off at the clatter of armour. A serjeant-at-arms, face almost hidden by the broad nose guard of his helmet, came hurrying out of the gloom.

‘Master Thibault,’ he gasped, ‘we have despatched archers and men-at-arms but the enemy command all approaches to the tavern. We could attack or encircle them but, I suspect, their defence will be fierce.’

‘Or,’ Lascelles snapped, ‘we could wait for those troops crossing the bridge to approach the south side and seal it off.’

‘They will have to thread their way through the needle-thin lanes of Southwark,’ Cranston declared. ‘They will not be able to move swiftly.’

‘Try and encircle them now,’ Thibault ordered.

‘They will resist fiercely,’ Cranston urged. ‘They will know what you plan and be prepared.’

‘Sir John, I hear what you say but time is passing and we should attack now.’

The serjeant glanced at Cranston, who just turned away. The officer hurried back to his post. Thibault, Lascelles and their escort followed. Cranston seized Athelstan’s arm.

‘The Earthworms are more cunning than Thibault thinks. The south side of the tavern looks out over a maze of alleyways; it could take hours before reinforcements arrive. The Earthworms will plot to break out. All they have to do is run a few yards deep into the protection of a dark Southwark night. There will be …’ Cranston’s words were drowned by screams of pain shrilling through the night. Both Athelstan and Cranston hurried across the Palisade, past the Barbican to the place of battle. Thibault’s men had lit fires. Cranston cursed this as a mistake as they only provided light for the Earthworms hiding behind the different windows of the tavern; their archers had already loosed a shower of shafts and bolts. Many of the Earthworms were master bowmen who had served in the royal arrays in France and elsewhere. They rarely missed their mark. Already corpses littered the ground. The screams of the wounded echoed through the night; these did nothing to hide the deadly sound of arrows and quarrels whirling through the darkness. Thibault’s officers tried to rush a door only to be beaten back, whilst their attempt to encircle the tavern had been reduced to a creeping crawl. The rain of arrows increased, their speed and accuracy frightening. Cranston and Athelstan hid behind a cart, watching the deadly hail fall time and again.

‘They are going to break out,’ Cranston murmured. ‘They have increased the intensity to numb us. An old trick which rarely fails.’ The volleys of arrows abruptly ceased. Lascelles shouted the order to advance. A few hapless souls did only to be immediately cut down. Again the death-bearing silence, only this time Thibault’s men remained hidden, the cries of their wounded comrades pitiful to hear. Athelstan tried to crawl to the nearest stricken man but Cranston pulled him back.

‘For God’s sake, wait,’ he urged. The silence lengthened, broken only by the fading moans of wounded and dying men. A door to the tavern was suddenly flung open. Thorne, a white cloth in one hand, a crucifix in the other, came tentatively out.

‘They are gone!’ he cried. Thibault’s men rose, hurried into the tavern and out through the main doorway. There was no one. Cranston and Athelstan followed. Thorne explained how the Earthworms had begun to slip away whilst the others had gathered at certain windows in an ever-diminishing mass.

‘You are correct, Sir John. The enemy will now be deep in the warren of streets beyond,’ Lascelles muttered. ‘The reinforcements will not be needed.’

Athelstan wondered whether he should go back to minister to the wounded and the dying. He just felt so tired, bleakly exhausted, drained by the fury of battle which had closed about him like a veil. Voices shouted, pleaded and cried. Armour clattered. Torches flared. Thibault was shouting for a search to be made. The smell of fire smoke, horse dung and sweat heightened Athelstan’s awareness of those spiritual odours: hate, fear, pain and desperation. Thibault was furiously deep in conversation. Lascelles made to walk away when Athelstan heard the angry whirr of a crossbow bolt. Lascelles stopped, hands reaching out; one shoulder slightly drooped. He walked towards Athelstan, entering a pool of light. He was blinking then he gagged, swaying on his feet, staring down in surprise at the crossbow bolt embedded deep in the right side of his chest. Lascelles walked forward again only to stagger sideways and, in doing so, intercepted a second quarrel aimed for his master but now shielded by himself. The quarrel smashed Lascelles’ skull and he tipped forward. Athelstan, ignoring Cranston’s cries and the clash of kite shields as a ring of steel was thrown around Thibault, hurried to the fallen man. Lascelles, however, was past all caring, his face a mottled mask of bloody froth, red skin and broken bone. He lay twitching and trembling as Athelstan tried to give him what spiritual comfort he could. The friar tried to calm his pitching stomach, the evening cold freezing the sweat on his body, the stinking muck of the yard and, above all, his curdling rage as the sheer futility of it all racked both mind and body. Horsemen appeared, hooves clattering, their leader shouting about how he had taken two prisoners, captured them, hooded and visored, as they tried to hide in a nearby alleyway. Thibault, screaming at his men to find the archer who killed Lascelles, abruptly fell silent. Athelstan rose wearily to his feet. Cranston’s hissed curse warned him. He glanced to his right; the two prisoners, arms bound tightly, staggered into the light. Athelstan stared in horror as Pike and Watkin, their faces blackened, scraps of the masks still tangled in their greasy hair, were pushed forward to fall on their knees. Thibault swept through his escort and, before he could be stopped, punched both prisoners viciously in the face. He pointed to the poles jutting out above the entrance to the tavern.

‘Hang them!’ he screamed. ‘They have been taken in arms against the crown. Hang them now!’ Thibault’s bully boys hurried both prisoners over to the tavern entrance. Athelstan could only watch. Ropes were produced, nooses fashioned and slung round the prisoners’ necks. Watkin shouted Athelstan’s name before he was hustled over to stand beneath one of the poles. Thibault’s men moved swiftly. Looping the rope over, they pulled and Watkin, gargling and choking, legs kicking, was hoisted off the ground. Athelstan recovered from his shock and lunged towards him. Cranston, with a speed that belied his size, swept forward, his sword creasing the air to slice the rope. Watkin crashed to the ground, coughing and spluttering.

‘Due process!’ Cranston yelled, turning round and drawing his dagger with his other hand. ‘Master Thibault, I am the king’s Lord High Coroner. I will not be a witness to summary murder.’

Thibault, his usual cherubic face glinting with sweat, his chest heaving and his lips twitching with rage, glared at Cranston.

‘Your brain is nimble as a clerk’s pen. Think, Master Thibault,’ Cranston warned. ‘If you hang them,’ he lifted both sword and dagger, ‘I will arrest you for murder. Both these men should be interrogated, indicted, tried and, if found guilty, hanged, but only then.’ The clamour of battle was fading. Brothers Marcel and Roger appeared in the tavern porch. Messengers approached but stood back, aware of this dangerous confrontation. Thibault was talking to himself; now and again he would glance at Lascelles’ corpse, then the two prisoners.

‘Take them away,’ the Master of Secrets barked. ‘Drag them, kick them and throw them into the Bocardo. They live in Southwark, they can rot in Southwark and, when I have my way, they will hang in Southwark.’

‘Wait.’ Athelstan walked over to the two prisoners. ‘God protect you,’ he whispered. ‘I will tell your families.’

Pike and Watkin, however, seemed different, no longer the two jesters of the parish but hard, solemn men, former soldiers, peasants who’d confronted all the cruelty of life. They didn’t seem interested in him but glared at Thibault. Athelstan caught the real hatred simmering there. He felt guilty at underestimating the fierce resentment which curdled these men’s souls and now threatened their very lives. Athelstan turned away to hide his own bitter tears.

‘I had better minister to the wounded,’ he murmured, ‘see to the dying and the dead.’

‘No need to,’ Cranston declared. ‘Brother Marcel, Brother Roger, you will help?’ Both men agreed. Pike and Watkin were dragged away. Athelstan just stood, arms crossed, staring down at the ground half-listening to Thibault’s officers report to their master how they had swept the tavern and found nothing. Thibault nodded and walked over to kneel in the mud beside Lascelles’ corpse. He took out his Ave beads and, eyes closed, began to loudly recite one Ave after another. Eleanor’s sobbing and that of Martha could now be heard, followed by the gruff voices of their menfolk trying to give comfort.

Cranston walked over to Athelstan and grasped his shoulder. ‘Little friar, come.’

‘No, Sir John.’ Athelstan gently prised himself loose. ‘Thank you for what you did, but I need to go home.’ Athelstan walked out into the warren of streets leading back to St Erconwald’s. By the time he reached the church the news had already arrived and families clustered anxiously in the nave. Athelstan gave whatever comfort he could to Watkin and Pike’s families, reassuring them, though he knew the truth of it, that all would be well and their menfolk released.

‘I hear what you say, Father,’ Pike’s wife Imelda declared, her hard eyes brimming with tears, ‘but Pike knows, you know and I know the way of the world.’

Athelstan could only sketch a blessing in the air above her head. The Bocardo was a rat-infested, stinking, foul prison down near the river. Cranston believed it was worse than Newgate or the Fleet, a living Hell where corrupt turnkeys, beadles and keepers ruled underground cells which would have disgraced a filthy hog pen.

The church eventually emptied, Athelstan’s reassurances ringing hollow along the nave. Once they were gone the friar slumped down at the base of a pillar and stared at the rood screen. Beyond it Hugh of Hornsey sheltered in sanctuary but Athelstan could not go there, not yet. He simply did not have the strength for more interrogation, more lies and sly evasions. Perhaps he should go across to the priest’s house and open that flask of wine Cranston had given him as a Yuletide gift. He would drink the rich red juice until sleep swallowed him.

‘Father?’

He glanced up. Benedicta was standing just behind him. ‘I thought you had left with the rest?’

‘You look tired, Father. Why not go to your house? I have left you a stew, rich and brown, the meat soft and minced, or you could eat at my house. I have wine?’ Athelstan held her gaze. ‘We could talk, plot what to do for poor Pike and Watkin.’

‘An invitation which cannot be resisted,’ Athelstan replied, clambering to his feet. ‘I am tired, I am lonely and I am angry.’

‘Father!’ Ranulf the rat-catcher came hurrying up the nave, banging the door behind him. ‘Father, I have to do a great ratting tonight in the cellars of a merchant’s house. He has offered me good silver. I need …’ The rat-catcher paused at the look on Athelstan’s face and glanced at Benedicta. ‘I am sorry,’ he muttered. Athelstan studied his peaked-white face peeping out of the stiffened tarred hood. Once again the friar was struck by the likeness between Ranulf and his two ferrets, Ferox and Audax. He abruptly leaned forward and pulled back the rat-catcher’s hood, studying his scrawny scalp and lined cheeks. ‘Father, what have I done?’

‘Nothing,’ Athelstan smiled, ‘except remind me that I am your priest. Ranulf, Benedicta, angels come in many forms. Now, Benedicta, fetch the holy water stoup from the sacristy. Let’s give Ferox and Audax the holiest of blessings.’ The widow woman hurried away. Athelstan stepped closer. ‘You are not really here about the ferrets, God save them, are you, Ranulf?’ The rat-catcher glared unblinkingly back. ‘You were there tonight, weren’t you, disguised as an Earthworm?’ Athelstan pointed to Ranulf’s head. ‘I can see the remains of the mask. What where you? The Jackdaw, the Magpie? Sir John has told me all about the Earthworms and their eerie disguises.’

‘Father, I have no idea …’

‘Of course you don’t, but you want to ask me what is going to happen to those other two birds of a feather, Watkin and Pike. Yes? Well, let me tell you the truth. They will hang within the week unless God or Sir John Cranston intervenes.’

‘And you, Father?’

Athelstan bit back his tart reply as Benedicta, all flustered, hurried back. To ease the tension Athelstan grasped the Asperges rod and intoned the blessing.

‘May the Lord turn his face to you and smile …’ Athelstan sprinkled the cages, ‘and may God make you what he always intended you to be, the finest ferrets ever.’ Ranulf, embarrassed by this little priest’s mood, grabbed the cages and left. Benedicta made to follow. Athelstan called her back. He grasped her hand and smiled.

‘Benedicta,’ he kissed her softly on the forehead and cheeks, ‘some angels are more welcome than others.’ He squeezed her hands. ‘Goodnight and God bless you for your kindness.’

She stepped back. ‘You will be all right, Father?’

‘Knowing that I have your love, Benedicta, of course.’ He watched her go, fighting the overwhelming urge to call her back. He closed his eyes and said a prayer before going round the church to lock and bolt the different doors. The Hangman of Rochester was fast asleep in his ankerhold, or at least pretending to be, and the friar wondered what role, if any, the enigmatic recluse had played in the dire events of that evening. Athelstan paused by the chantry chapel. In truth he was deeply worried about Pike and Watkin. Thibault’s justice would be swift and brutal. The two prisoners would appear before the justices of oyer and terminer: if found guilty, and Athelstan believed they would be, they’d hang. He knew about Thibault’s macabre sense of humour: the Hangman of Rochester might well be hired to carry out the execution, which could take place just outside St Erconwald’s for all to see. Would the Upright Men allow that? And what about these mysteries? Athelstan walked into the centre of the nave and stared down at the paving slabs, row upon row of oblong stone. He walked carefully along, putting one foot in front of the other. What happens, he wondered, if the mysteries which confronted him were all tangled but with one root, like some shrub in God’s Acre? He conceded to himself this was the direction he was tempted to follow: to dig deep, find that root and pull it up. But what if it was otherwise, like these paving stones? Three lines which ran parallel but never crossed. It would be easy to argue that Beowulf was both the spy and the murderer. But perhaps he should keep them separate? Should he accept that he was in fact hunting three people, not one? Athelstan paused at the thought. ‘I’ll do that,’ he murmured, ‘when I have the time, energy and peace. I am going to sit and think.’ Already memories and images floated through his mind, but he considered them to be like leaves on the wind – nothing substantial: a phrase here, a remark there.