This final distinction was not lost on the monk.
‘You mean did he swallow it himself — or was it given to him by some other person?’
When John nodded, Philip shook his head. ‘I cannot tell you from a physician’s point of view — all I can say is that it must have gone down his throat somehow. But as a man of God, I must surely believe that no priest would have endangered his immortal soul by deliberately swallowing a fatal dose of foxglove in order to kill himself.’
Nodding his head in fervent agreement, Thomas pursued this aspect. ‘Could you tell how large a dose was taken and how long before?’
Philip pursed his lips as he considered this. ‘Without knowing anything of the circumstances before he came here, it is difficult. Was he well until having his last meal, for instance, which might mean the poison was introduced into his food or drink? It must have been a large dose if the interval was short, for his symptoms were very severe.’
‘How is foxglove usually given?’ asked John.
‘All of the plant is dangerous, the leaves, stems and roots,’ explained Philip. ‘Chewing those could cause symptoms, but the severity of this case suggests to me that a strong extract was used. A watery infusion is most common, unless dried and powdered plant is used. But a tincture, where an extract in spirits of wine is used, is the most potent.’
‘Is this drug easily obtainable?’ asked Gwyn, entering the discussion for the first time.
‘At the right season, anyone wandering the country lanes could pick a sackful!’ replied the monk. ‘And the wise women who practise their helpful art in every village will have dried plants hanging in all their cottages. For a strong powder or a tincture, one would probably need to visit an apothecary’s shop, but there’s no lack of those in London.’
De Wolfe rasped his fingers over the black stubble on his cheeks as an aid to thought. ‘I agree that it seems highly unlikely that a rich canon would deliberately do away with himself, so that leaves murder or accident,’ he said. ‘Could it have been accidental?’
Again the monk shrugged. ‘As I said, it only needs a large spoonful of the strong tincture to do fatal damage to the heart. Normally, the tincture is given as a few drops. As long as the foxglove goes down the throat, it is potent — but it seems straining belief to think of any accident that could cause a person to drink it in error.’
The coroner agreed with Philip. ‘So that leaves us with murder as the most likely option! Is that feasible? Does foxglove have a foul taste?’
‘It is bitter, but only a small volume of the tincture is needed, which could be concealed in food or especially in wine. I have never seen a death from foxglove before, though I have had children who have unwisely chewed foxglove plants and once I saw a woman who had taken too much of her dried powder prescribed for dropsy. These people fell ill, but recovered as the dose was less than a fatal one.’
They talked around the matter for several more minutes, but it became apparent that Brother Philip had no more to tell them and he was anxious to get back to his care of the sick, a marathon task for only eleven monks and four nuns to attempt in the face of the huge population of the nearby city. They left him with thanks and a promise to notify Westminster of the death, so that Simon Basset’s earthly remains could be collected for burial.
On the way out to collect their horses, they stopped at the lodge, where John interrogated the gatekeeper. He was not the man on duty when Simon Basset was admitted, but he was soon found and had a clear recollection of the event.
‘We rarely get a priest brought in a chair litter,’ he observed. ‘Especially from a brothel!’
‘A brothel?’ barked the coroner. ‘How do you know that?’
‘The chair men told me that they had picked him up at Margery’s whorehouse in Stinking Lane. She gave them two pence to bring him here, to get rid of him, it seems.’
De Wolfe groaned — this bloody mystery was getting more complicated by the minute.
‘Did they tell you anything else?’ he demanded.
‘Only that the fellow was puking all the way and muttering and groaning. He kept saying that his vision had gone green and yellow — they thought he was either drunk or out of his wits.’
There was nothing else to be got from the man, and after taking directions the trio set off for Stinking Lane. They trotted through some squalid lanes to nearby Aldersgate and entered the city through the stone arch in the great walls that had surrounded London since the time of the Roman Empire. Stinking Lane appeared no more foul than the other narrow streets nearby, all of which had piles of rubbish outside the houses and sewage trickling down the central gutter in the unpaved thoroughfare between the motley collection of buildings. John reined in halfway down the lane, looking around for the most likely location for a brothel.
‘We’re right in the city sheriff’s territory now,’ grunted Gwyn. ‘Is he going to take kindly to us investigating on his patch, after all that damned fuss he made the other day?’
De Wolfe glowered around at the closely packed houses, some of which had upper storeys hanging over the street.
‘He took the trouble to send us that messenger telling us of Basset’s corpse, so it looks as if he’s got no interest in it,’ he replied. ‘Now which of these bloody ratholes is Margery’s stew?’
Thomas walked his small palfrey on a few yards, to where a cripple in rags was squatting against the wall, picking through a heap of discarded vegetables for something still edible. Surreptitiously slipping the beggar a halfpenny that he could ill-afford, the soft-hearted clerk came back with the information that Margery’s brothel — not the only one in the lane — was the large house with a red door further down on the left.
Gwyn hammered on the door and a girl opened it. She looked startled at the sight of a huge man with wild red hair and moustache, assuming that he was a customer she might have to satisfy. ‘You want a woman, sir? Come in, we are sure to have something to your tastes.’
Then she caught sight of the two men on horses waiting in the street. ‘There are three of you? You’d best take your steeds around to the yard at the back.’
Gwyn managed to interrupt her flow of words. Grinning at the good-looking girl, who was about seventeen, he patted her paternally on her dark hair. ‘We don’t want your favours, lass, we want your mistress. We are law officers, seeking to discover something about a priest who was taken ill here two days ago.’
The mention of the law made the strumpet uneasy. Though it was not her problem, she knew that Margery had paid her usual bribes to the sheriff’s constables to leave them in peace, but she had also heard that their regular customer Canon Simon had died in St Bartholomew’s. Opening the door wider, she stood aside.
‘You need to speak to Dame Margery, then. And to Lucy, no doubt, for it was she who was with Fat Simon when he was took ill!’
By now, John de Wolfe had dismounted and had advanced to the door, leaving Thomas to guard their horses, knowing that the prim little priest would be most reluctant to enter a house of ill-repute. At the same time, the madam of the establishment had appeared, attracted by the voices.
Before she could open her red-painted mouth, John had boomed some orders.
‘Take us somewhere where we can speak!’ he commanded. ‘I am the king’s coroner and need to question you and your drabs.’
Margery of Edmonton had enough experience of both men and officials to know that here was someone who could neither be trifled with, nor bribed with money or sensuous favours. Without a word, she led the way down a short passage to a large room where there were clean rushes on the floor, several couches and chairs and a counter where a hogshead of ale and jars of cider and wine were displayed. With a flounce of her henna-stained hair, she turned to face de Wolfe.
‘Where are the sheriff’s men, sir? They usually deal with sad accidents such as this.’
‘This was no accident, woman. The canon was murdered,’ he snapped. The brothel-keeper’s powdered face cracked in an expression of outraged disbelief.
‘Well, he wasn’t murdered here. This is a respectable house!’ she added illogically, considering the nature of her business.
She sat down on a chair, but did not invite her unwelcome visitors to join her. The girl from the front door stood protectively behind her and now several other young women, all pretty and dressed in coloured silk gowns, appeared inquisitively at the doorway from the passage. De Wolfe, who in his younger days had more than a nodding acquaintance with whorehouses, recognised that this was a superior type of establishment with prices well above the stews that catered for the lower classes.
‘You were aware who the dead man was?’ began John, harshly.
‘Father Simon, some chaplain in the king’s service,’ replied the madam defensively. ‘We get a number of men of the cloth in here. Supposed to be celibate, I know, but that’s their business, not ours.’
‘He was a cathedral canon and an official of the Exchequer,’ snapped the coroner. ‘An important royal officer and I want to know who killed him!’
Margery, now pallid under her make-up, began protesting that he had died of bad food and that his death was nothing to do with her, but John cut across her excuses.
‘Did he say where he had been before he came to relieve himself here?’ he demanded.
For answer, the woman beckoned to one of the girls in the doorway. ‘Lucy, you attended to the priest. Come here and tell the coroner what you know.’
Reluctantly, Lucy sidled into the room and stood before John, her eyes downcast. He thought she was too fresh and attractive to be used by any man who had four pence, though he also knew that many girls eventually found a husband amongst their clients.
‘Tell me exactly what happened, Lucy,’ asked de Wolfe in a more kindly tone. ‘If you have done nothing wrong, you have nothing to fear.’
‘He was a nice, kind man,’ she said with a sniff. ‘I’m sorry he’s dead — but I know nothing about it. I tried to help him when he was so sick.’
‘He was well enough when he arrived,’ mumbled Margery, but Lucy shook her head. ‘He was not his normal self even then. I noticed his brow was sweating, but thought he was excited at what was to come. Then we went up to one of the rooms upstairs and as he began taking off his clothing, he started to groan and clutch his stomach.’
‘Did he say anything about where he had been?’ asked de Wolfe, but Lucy wanted to tell her story at her own pace.
‘He slumped down on the pallet and pulled off his hose, then apologised for not feeling well. He said it must have been something he had eaten, though he had dined with a friend at a good inn so it was surprising that there should be anything amiss with the food.’
The coroner seized upon this. ‘Did he say who the friend was? Or which inn they had visited?’
To his chagrin, the girl shook her head. ‘It was at that very moment that he started to vomit. From then on, his speech made no sense, he was too occupied in throwing up and groaning. I tried to comfort him and clean him up as best I could, but soon had to call the mistress, as he became so distressed.’
In spite of more questioning of Lucy, her mistress and the other whores, de Wolfe failed to extract any other useful information. It seemed clear that following a good meal at a decent hostelry in the company of a friend, Simon Basset had arrived at his favourite brothel for his regular fornication. He was unwell on arrival and rapidly deteriorated, showing all the symptoms of foxglove poisoning, according to Brother Philip. Death had occurred without him becoming rational enough to explain what had happened and once again the coroner was stuck with a mystery.
They left for the ride back to Westminster with an extra horse led on a head-rope behind Gwyn’s mare, for the canon’s mount had still been tethered in the yard behind the whorehouse. The crafty Margery had failed to mention it, no doubt hoping to sell the beast, until Gwyn had queried how Basset had arrived in Stinking Lane. Reluctantly, she admitted that the horse was still there and John hurried to examine it in case the saddlebag contained some further clue — for a moment he even wondered if some of the lost treasure might be there. In the event, there was nothing, but they decided to return the valuable nag to the house in King Street, when John called to give them the sad news.
During the ride back, Thomas asked what he should do about recording the investigation on his rolls and whether there was to be an inquest.
‘This is a case well out of the ordinary,’ mused John. ‘I’ll do nothing until I confer with Hubert Walter. With someone who was both a canon and a senior Treasury official, found poisoned in a brothel, I have to tread carefully, especially as he may well be involved in the theft of the king’s treasure from the Tower.’
The more he thought about it, the more delicate the situation appeared. Though he himself was presently in good grace with the Justiciar and even the king, neither were men to be trifled with or offended — and there were many other powerful men, especially on the Curia, who would be happy to use de Wolfe as a scapegoat if some great scandal erupted.
Apart from that, John had no appetite for exposing the sexual inclinations of a pleasant priest through a public inquest. Though he was a stickler for applying the king’s will, there were issues such as the relative immunity of those in holy orders from the secular law, which gave them ‘benefit of clergy’. Especially since old King Henry’s conscience-stricken surrender to Canterbury over this issue, following the murder of Thomas Becket, one had to tread softly where priests were concerned and John was not going to put his head in a noose by doing the wrong thing.
His silent cogitations lasted for most of the journey and both Thomas and Gwyn had learned not to disturb their master when he was in this contemplative mood. At the house in King Street, one of the grooms saw them coming and recognised the canon’s horse being led home riderless and drew the correct conclusions. He rushed into the house and by the time de Wolfe dismounted, Martin the steward and Chaplain Gilbert had come out to meet him, their faces full of anguished foreboding.
The coroner solemnly confirmed their fears, and taking the chaplain aside explained the circumstances of the canon’s death. ‘It is up to you how much you tell the rest of the household, but I would advise you holding back some of the details, at least until I have discussed it with the archbishop.’
Gilbert was a sensible man and through his grief — for it seemed that Simon had been a popular and caring master — he promised to be discreet about revealing the whole truth. He also promised to set in motion the process of retrieving the corpse from St Bartholomew’s and arranging a funeral, dependent on the coroner’s decision about an inquest. He would also send a messenger to Lichfield to inform the cathedral and any surviving family of the death.
Promising to keep him informed, de Wolfe left the house to the stunned residents, who were no doubt wondering when they would be thrown out into the street following the collapse of their comfortable little world.