The Nightingale Gallery (2 page)

Below stairs the servants slept on, their stomachs gorged, their brains dull with the scraps of food and wine they had gulped. In one chamber lay a maid, the hem of her skirts pushed into her mouth, twisting in mute passion under the hot probing loins of a young groom. She need not have worried about uttering any cries. The wide stairs above were deserted, as was the wood-panelled gallery which swept past the master bedrooms. In one a man and woman lay entwined, their skins gleaming with sweat as they writhed and turned under the blue and scarlet canopy of the four-poster bed. A silver candelabra, set on a red- and white-tiled table top, gave the room a golden glow which was reflected in the precious silver thread of the wall hangings as well as the costly silk and lace clothes scattered over the floor. Further along the gallery, in the great bedroom of the master of the house, Sir Thomas Springall, Murder brooded from its ghostly corner. Sir Thomas did not expect it. Oh, no! He ignored the preacher’s words: ‘In the midst of life we are in death.’ Like the rich man in scripture, Springall was planning on destroying his old barns and building new ones, as befitted a merchant who had fingers in every silver pie. Sir Thomas lay between his silken gold-fringed sheets and basked in his wealth. He was pleased the old king was dead. A young boy now wore the crown.

‘Woe to the realm where the king is a child!’ Sir Thomas whispered, and laughed softly. ‘Thank God!’ he muttered. The regent needed him and Springall would prosper even more for he knew Gaunt’s secrets. Sir Thomas licked his thick red lips. He stared into the darkness, across to the table where the Syrians, his precious chess set, glowed in the moonlight streaming through the casement window. More wealth would come. Springall would have entry to the treasure chambers of the kingdom. And the keys to such riches? The Book of the Apocalypse, 6, Verse 8. And the other? Genesis 3, Verse 1. Springall smiled, rolled on one side and stared down at the cleverly carved bed posts. He thought of his wife, she of the chestnut curls, golden skin and eyes blue as a fresh spring sky. But Springall desired other flesh. He gripped the bed clothes and, at that moment, knew something was wrong. He clutched his throat, but too late. Murder was upon him.

CHAPTER 1

Brother Athelstan sat on a plinth of stone before the rood screen of St Erconwald’s church in Southwark. He stared despairingly up at the hole in the red-tiled roof then at the dirty puddle of rain water which shimmered on the flagstones two yards away from his sandalled feet. He stroked his clean-shaven face and glared down at the small scroll of parchment in his hand.

‘You know, Bonaventure,’ he murmured, ‘and I say this in the spirit of obedience, so don’t repeat my words if he ever comes, but Father Prior’s remarks about my past cut like barbs.’

He folded the parchment neatly into a perfect square and slipped it into the battered leather wallet on his belt.

‘I daily atone for my sins,’ he continued. ‘I observe most strictly the rule of St Dominic and, as you know, I spend both day and night in the care of souls.’

God knows, Athelstan thought, tapping the flagstones with his feet, the harvest of souls was great; the filthy alleyways, the piss-soaked runnels and poor hovels of his parish sheltered broken people whose minds and souls had been bruised and poisoned by grinding poverty. The great, fat ones of the land did not care a fig but hid behind empty words, false promises and a lack of compassion which even Herod would have blushed at. Athelstan stared around the empty church, noting the dirty walls, peeling pillars, and the fresco of St John the Baptist. Athelstan grinned. He knew the Baptist had been beheaded but not whilst he was preaching! Someone had scrubbed the painting, removing St John’s head as well as those of his attentive listeners.

‘You have seen my house, Bonaventure? It’s no more than a white-washed shed with two rooms, a wooden door and a window which does not fit. My horse, Philomel, may be an aged destrier, but it eats as if there is no tomorrow and can go no faster than a shuffling cat.’ He smiled. ‘I mean no offence to present company, but he drains my purse. Now, I am not moaning, I am just mentioning these matters to remind ourselves of our present state, so I can advise my prior that his paternal strictures are not necessary.’ Athelstan sighed and went over into the small carrel built into the wall near the Lady Chapel where he had been penning his reply to the Father Prior. He picked up his quill, thought for a while and began writing.

As I have said, Reverend Father, my purse is empty, shrivelled up and tight as a usurer’s soul. My collection boxes have been stolen and the chancery screen is in disrepair. The altar is marked and stained, the nave of the church is often covered with huge pools of water for our roof serves as more of a colander than a covering. God knows I atone for my sins. I seem to be steeped in murder, bloody and awful. It taxes my mind and reminds me of my own great crime. I have served the people here six months now and I have also assumed those duties assigned by you, to be clerk and scrivener to Sir John Cranston, coroner in the city of London.

Time and again he takes me with him to sit over the body of some man, woman or child pitifully slain. ‘Is it murder, suicide or an accident?’ he asks and so the dreadful stories begin. Often death results from stupidity: a woman forgets how dangerous it is for a child to play out in the cobbled streets, dancing between the hooves of iron-shod horses or the creaking wheels of huge carts as they bring their produce up from the river; still a child is slain, the little body crushed, bruised and marked, while the young soul goes out to meet its Christ. But, Reverend Father, there are more dreadful deaths. Men drunk in taverns, their bellies awash with cheap ale, their souls dead and black as the deepest night as they lurch at each other with sword, dagger or club. I always keep a faithful record.

Yet, every word I hear, every sentence I write, every time I visit the scene of the murder, I go back to that bloody field fighting for Edward the Black Prince. I, a novice monk, who broke his vows to God and took his younger brother off to war. Every night I dream of that battle, the press of steel-clad men, the lowered pikes, the screams and shouts. Each time the nightmare goes like a mist clearing above the river, leaving only me kneeling beside the corpse of my dead brother, screaming into the darkness for his soul to return. I know, Reverend Father, it never will.

Athelstan scrutinised the words he had written, replaced the quill beside his letter and walked back to the chancel screen. He looked across as Bonaventure rose and stretched elegantly.

‘I intend no offence, Bonaventure,’ he said. ‘I mean, Sir John, despite his portly frame, that plum-red face, balding pate and watery eye, is, you will agree, at heart a good man. An honest official, a rare fellow indeed who does not take bribes but searches for the truth, ever patient in declaring the real cause of death. But why must I always be with him?’

Athelstan went back to sit before the rood screen. What use was it to list the terrible murders and scenes of violence he had witnessed? What would Father Prior know of them? Souls sent out into the dark before their time, unprepared and unshriven. Men with their eyes gouged out, their throats cut, their genitals ripped off. Women crushed beneath scaffolding or horribly murdered in some stinking alleyway. If Christ came to London, Athelstan thought, he would surely cross to Southwark, where poverty and crime sat like two ugly brothers or wandered the streets hand-in-hand spreading their stench. Bonaventure rose and padded gently over to him. Athelstan stared down at the cat.

‘Perhaps I should tell Father Prior about you, Bonaventure,’ he said, admiring the sleek black body of the alley cat which he had adopted, noting the white mask and paws, the tattered ear, the half-closed eye.

‘You’re a mercenary,’ he continued, stroking the cat gently on the top of its head. ‘But my most faithful parishioner. For a dish of milk and a few scraps of fish you will sit patiently whilst I talk to you, and be most attentive during Mass.’

Athelstan jumped as he heard a sound behind him. He looked round the chancel screen and realised how dark it was in the church, the only light being that from a taper lit before the statue of the Madonna. He yawned. He had not slept the previous evening. He did not like to close his eyes on dreams where he saw his brother’s marble-white and glassy face, the eyes always staring at him. So, instead, he had climbed to the top of the church tower to observe the stars, for the movements of the heavens had fascinated him ever since he had begun studying them in Prior Bacon’s observatory on Folly Bridge at Oxford. He had been tired and slightly fearful as well, for Godric, a well-known murderer and assassin, had begged for sanctuary in the church. Since his arrival Godric had lain curled up like a dog in the corner of the sanctuary, sleeping off his exhaustion. He had eaten Athelstan’s supper, pronounced himself well and settled down to a good night’s sleep. ‘How is it?’ Athelstan murmured, ‘that such men can sleep so well?’ Godric had slain a man, struck him down in the market place, taken his purse and fled. He had hoped to escape but had had the misfortune to encounter a group of city officials and their retainers who had raised the ‘Hue and Cry’ and pursued him to St Erconwald’s. Athelstan had been trying to repair the chancel screen and let him in after he hammered on the door. Godric had brushed past him, gasping, waving the dagger still bloody from his crime, and ran up the nave, shouting: ‘Sanctuary! Sanctuary!’ The pursuing officials had not come into the church though they expected Athelstan, as clerk to Sir John Cranston, to hand Godric over. Athelstan had refused.

‘This is God’s house!’ he’d shouted. ‘Protected by Holy Mother Church and the King’s decree!’

So they had left him and Godric alone although they had placed a guard on the door and swore they would kill the murderer if he attempted to escape. Athelstan peered through the darkness. Godric still lay sleeping.

Athelstan prepared the altar for Mass, laying out the rather tattered missal and two candlesticks so bent they could hardly stand straight. A chipped, silver-gilt chalice, paten and small glass cruets, containing water and wine, were placed on the spotless altar cloth. Athelstan went into the dank sacristy, put on the alb and scarlet cope, crossed himself and went out to begin the magic of the Mass, priest before God, offering Christ to the Father under the appearances of bread and wine. Athelstan blessed himself as he intoned the introductory psalm.

‘I will go into the altar of God, unto God who gives joy to my youth.’

Godric snored on, oblivious to the drama being enacted a few yards away. Bonaventure sidled up to the foot of the altar steps. The cat licked its lips, swishing its long tail in anticipation of a deep bowl of creamy milk as his reward for attention and patience. Athelstan, now caught up by the music of the words of the Mass, swept through the readings of the Epistle and the Gospel, reaching the Offertory where he mingled the water and wine. At the far end of the church a door opened and a hooded figure slipped in, moving soundlessly up the darkened nave to kneel beside Bonaventure at the foot of the steps. Athelstan forced himself to keep his eyes down on the white circle of bread over which he had breathed the words of consecration, transforming it into the body of Christ. The consecration over, he intoned the Lord’s Prayer:
‘Pater Noster, quiest in caelis.’

His voice rang loud and clear through the hollow nave. He paused, as the canon of the Mass dictated, to pray for the dead. He remembered Fulke the warrener, a member of his parish killed in a tavern brawl four nights earlier. Then Athelstan’s own parents and his brother Francis . . . the friar closed his eyes against the hot tears welling there as the faces of his family appeared, clear and distinct in his mind’s eye.

‘God grant them eternal rest,’ he whispered.

He stood swaying against the altar, wondering for the hundredth time why he felt like an assassin. Oh, in France he had killed men whilst fighting for the Black Prince, the old king’s eldest son, who wanted to unite the crowns of France and Castille with that of England. Athelstan had shot arrows as good and true as the rest. He remembered the corpse of a young French knight, his cornflower blue eyes gazing sightlessly up at the sky, his blond hair framing his face like a halo, Athelstan’s barbed arrow embedded deeply in his throat between helmet and gorget. The friar prayed for this unknown knight yet he felt no guilt. This was war and the Church taught that war was part of man’s sinful condition, the legacy of Adam’s revolt.

‘Oh, God, am I a murderer?’ he whispered to himself.

Athelstan thought once again how, as a novice in Black-friars, near the western wall of the city, he had broken his vows and fled back to his father’s farm in Sussex. His mind had been filled with dreams of war and he had encouraged his younger brother in similar fantasies. They had joined one of those merry bands of archers who swung along the sunny, dusty lanes of Sussex down to Dover and across a shimmering sea, to reap glory in the green fields of France. His brother had been killed and Athelstan had brought the grim news back to the red-tiled Sussex farm. His parents had died of sheer grief. Athelstan had returned to Black-friars to lie on the cold flagstoned floor of the Chapter House. He had confessed his sin, begged for absolution, and dedicated his life to God as reparation for the grievous sins he had committed.

‘A guilt greater than Cain’s,’ Father Prior had declared to the brothers assembled in the Chapter House. ‘Cain killed his brother. Athelstan is responsible for breaking his vows, and, in doing so, bringing about the deaths of his entire family!’

‘Father!’

Athelstan opened his eyes quickly. The woman kneeling on the steps was staring up at him, her beautiful face drawn with concern.

‘Father, is there anything wrong?’

‘No, Benedicta, I am sorry.’

The Mass continued, the
Agnus Dei
followed by Communion. Athelstan took a host down to the waiting woman who tilted back her head, eyes closed, full red lips open and tongue out, waiting for Athelstan to place Christ’s body there. For a second he paused, admiring the flawless beauty: the soft golden-hued skin now stretched across the high cheekbones; the long eye-lashes like dark butterfly wings, quiveringly closed; the parted lips showing white, perfectly formed teeth.