‘My apologies for any harsh treatment of those two madcaps Pike and Watkin, but what you propose is even more foolish. Heresy is like a plague. The Church believes such infection spreads swiftly. Suspicion will fall on you, a preacher, a priest who works amongst the poor. They will drag you in for questioning and, in their eyes, that’s guilt enough. They will trap you-’
‘Sir John, I assure you, they may well question me but they will not trap me. No priest will help Sparwell because he fears he will lose all hope of preferment and be doomed to some paltry benefice. Now tell me, Sir John,’ Athelstan grinned, ‘where could they send me? They regard St Erconwald’s as punishment enough.’
‘Very well, Brother, but I will stay with you. The Carnifex has already despatched more of his assistants to the Palisade, Southwark’s old execution ground. I wager Thorne will make a good profit from the crowds. We will make our way through the streets and take the riverside path on to the Palisade. Brother, this will be heinous. The Carnifex has informed me how the bishop’s court has ruled mors sine misericordia – death without mercy.’
‘Death without mercy. For God’s sake, Sir John, that is obvious enough.’ Cranston drew Athelstan closer.
‘Oh no, Brother, worse than that. Sparwell will have green wood stacked close around him so the flames will be slow burning. The Carnifex has been instructed not to offer the mercy of a swift strangulation or, even better, a pouch of gunpowder around his neck. Sparwell will die slowly. Remember that.’ Athelstan gazed pitifully at Sparwell, now lying moaning on the hurdle. He squeezed Cranston’s hand and walked back to kneel by the prisoner.
‘I shall stay with you,’ he promised. ‘But Master Sparwell, what brought you to this? I know the Papal Inquisitor Brother Marcel has come to hunt the likes of you.’
‘Oh, we know he has arrived in England.’ Sparwell turned his face towards Athelstan, leaning forward as much as he could. His lips were dry and his tongue swollen, so Athelstan fetched more water, which he fed to him in small sips. The chamber was now filling with other guards and a small party from the Bishop of London’s court. One of these, a high-browed, pale-faced cleric, approached Athelstan, his mouth all twitching: the friar rose to meet him.
‘Brother!’ he whispered hoarsely. ‘We understand that you will accompany the prisoner, a condemned heretic?’
‘A soul,’ Athelstan retorted fiercely. ‘A human being in his last extremities, a very frightened man, bruised and injured. He is alone. He has no family?’
‘None that we know of. A tailor who thought he could dabble in theology, a follower of the damnable Wycliffe. Brother, the bishop will not be pleased.’
‘Jesus might be.’ Athelstan grinned at the shock in the cleric’s face. ‘Who knows, I might even convert Sparwell. The bishop would not object to that would he, Master …?’
‘Master Tuddenham.’
‘Well, Master Tuddenham, you deal with your business and leave me to deal with God’s.’
The cleric spun on his heel and, bony body all twitching, scurried across to gossip in a huddle with the rest of his party.
Athelstan shrugged and took a fresh stoup of water to Sparwell. Once he drank, Athelstan leaned down.
‘The Inquisitor, is this his handiwork?’
‘Brother, as I said, we knew about his arrival in England. We were terrified but so far he has posed no threat to our conventicles, our meetings.’ He spluttered through bloodied lips. ‘I trust you, Brother. True, cacullus non facit monachum – the cowl doesn’t make the monk – but in your case it does. You have a good heart, so I will tell you what brought me here. Our conventicles meet beyond the city walls, desolate places such as Moorfields or parts of Southwark where it is easy to escape the bishop’s spies. Our beliefs are well known. Pope and priest mean nothing to us. We will have nothing to do with superstitious geegaws, putrid relics, gaily painted statues or other religious baubles.’
‘But how were you captured?’ Athelstan insisted, his curiosity now roused.
‘I am tailor, a good one. Enemies, rivals must have denounced me. In truth it wouldn’t be hard. I stopped attending Sunday Mass, I did not observe the holy days. I did not pay my tithes.’
‘Do you,’ Athelstan sighed, ‘did you, want to die my friend? You certainly raised the banner which would attract the attention of those who mattered. Tell me, is Sir Robert Paston one of yours?’
‘No, no.’ The answer came so swiftly Athelstan wondered if Sparwell was defending the manor lord. Any further conversation was hampered by shouts and cries. The great prison door had been opened. A cold breeze swept the chamber with all the smells of Southwark. The execution was about to begin. Athelstan had to stand aside as the sledges and hurdle were secured and dragged by the Carnifex and his coven out of the chamber and down the passageway to the yard outside. Athelstan and Cranston followed close behind. The friar opened his chancery satchel and looped the purple-hued stole around his neck. Outside all the midnight folk of Southwark had assembled, a sea of hard-pinched faces: whores in their flame-coloured garb surrounded by their hooded pimps; the capuchoned counterfeits and cranks; the ill-witted and the sharp-eyed; and all the predators from the slums. Athelstan recalled what Cranston often said, that the only person who could safely walk unarmed through the streets of Southwark were friars such as himself. This horde of rifflers shouted and cursed. Mud and other filth rained down on Sparwell as his hurdle was harnessed to a massive dray horse caparisoned in a black-and-white sheet, its mane all hogged and festooned with red ribbons, its thick tail decorated with scraps of scarlet cloth. The hurdle was fastened tight, the Bishop of London’s people assembled at the front and the macabre procession moved off.
Athelstan walked slowly behind the hurdle as Sparwell began his journey along what was known as the ‘path of thorns’, dragged across the cobbles, ruts and sharp-edged potholes of Southwark. Athelstan deliberately kept as close as he could so the filth-pelters might think twice before hurling refuse which might hit a priest they recognized. Cranston’s presence was also a help; curses and threats were hurled at him but his large, swaggering figure and gleaming drawn sword deterred any real mischief. Athelstan tried not to look at Sparwell, jerking and twisting in searing pain, as the hurdle bounced across the ground. The friar recited the Mercy Psalm but found he could not get past the opening line: ‘Have mercy on us O God in thy kindness; in thy infinite compassion blot out our offence.’ What kindness, what compassion? Athelstan thought bitterly, walking through this charnel house of broken souls, twisted spirits and bruised bodies. Athelstan could only recall a poem he’d learnt as a young soldier in France: ‘The moon is pretty on the wave, the blossoms of the sky bright as lights.’ Athelstan crossed himself. He glanced at the crowd, catching glimpses of those thronging around but held back by the burly sheriff’s men. Two workers from the tanneries at the Tower were offering homemade pomanders as protection against the smell. A beggar-monk stood holding a skull, all white and bony, as if it was some precious vessel. A woman clasped a frightened child close to her face. A painted doxy, drunk and raucous, screamed abuse as the thick paste covering her poxed face began to run in the persistent drizzle which had begun to fall. A fire-eater, dressed in the garish red and green costume of a salamander, held a candle as he intoned a prayer, whilst a pickpocket with clipped ears and a mangled nose tried to open the fire-eater’s purse. The reeking smells of the streets billowed sometimes, hidden by the gusts of incense from the thurible carried by the Bishop of London’s party. Eventually they turned, leaving the crumbling tenements behind them, going down an incline on to the path which ran along the riverbank. The rain stopped falling. Athelstan noticed Cranston had disappeared. The friar curbed his own anxiety and returned to reciting snatches of psalms, trying to keep calm amidst the raucous noise, foul smells and the sheer horror of what was happening.