‘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 …’