Athelstan nodded, quietly marvelling at the trickery.
‘Now, if the crucifix had been hung in a cold church,’ the Sanctus Man continued, enjoying himself, ‘the wax would harden, and inside the cavity both the blood and the tincture would eventually dry. The longer it was left, the harder it would become.’
‘The candles!’ Athelstan exclaimed. ‘When the crucifix was put up near the baptismal font, candles were lit. The iron spigots were on a level with the Saviour’s body’
‘The heat would liquefy the blood and the tincture,’ the Sanctus Man explained. ‘And you have a crucified Jesus who bleeds.’
‘But so much blood!’ Cranston exclaimed.
‘The cavities can always be refilled.’
Athelstan walked towards his now cowed parishioners. ‘Why?’ he demanded. ‘Why this knavery? Are you so short of pennies? Must you cause such mischief, petty blasphemy, trickery!’
‘Tell him,’ Huddle cried at Watkin. ‘Father,’ the painter continued, ‘I confess it was my idea. A painter in Genoa had done something similar, a sailor told me whilst I was dining in the Piebald tavern. I told Watkin…’
The parishioners stepped away from the dung-collector, who began noisily to protest.
‘You always insist on being leader of the parish council!’ Pike shouted treacherously. ‘Tell Father the truth!’
Watkin stepped forward like a little boy. ‘We did it for you, Father,’ he declared, shrugging his leather-garbed shoulders. ‘Oh, I admit, Father, I have spent some of the money on refreshments…’
‘That’s a crime!’ Cranston bellowed.
Athelstan gestured for silence. ‘Did you know, Benedicta?’ he asked quietly.
She shook her head. ‘I think you should ask them why: I have a faint suspicion.’
‘We’ve heard you were leaving,’ Watkin blurted out. ‘Sir John here, in his cups at the Piebald tavern, was mourning the fact, after you and he had returned from that bloody business at Westminster.’
‘And?’ Cranston asked.
‘We were going to give the money to you,’ Watkin declared defiantly.
‘I beg your…!’
‘Oh, not as a bribe,’ Tab the tinker added anxiously. ‘We were going to ask you to take it to the Regent, honestly, Sir John, give it to him as a gift.’ He wetted his lips. ‘If not the Regent, the mayor, some alderman: anyone with influence with Father Prior.’
Athelstan confronted his parishioners. ‘Don’t lie,’ he warned.
‘We are not, Father,’ they all chorused back.
‘Do you all swear,’ Athelstan raised his voice, ‘that that was the reason you did it? Swear on the cross and the lives of your children?’
The parishioners now roared their assent.
‘But you still did wrong,’ Athelstan declared, shaking his head. ‘You did very wrong and restitution has to be made.’ He thrust the crucifix into Huddle’s hands. ‘Burn this!’ he ordered. ‘You will tell the curiosity-seekers that the candles caught the wood. God’s fire burnt it.’
‘I’ll do it now, Father.’
Huddle loped off, the crucifix under his arm, to the small brick enclosure behind the church where Athelstan made a bonfire of materials no longer needed.
‘Sir John will collect all the money,’ Athelstan continued. ‘Every single penny. He will keep it in trust and give it to one of the almshouses in the city. For the rest, I must thank…’ He turned but the Sanctus Man had disappeared, going as quietly as he came.
‘Sir John! Sir John!’ Flaxwith, covered in sweat, came hobbling through the cemetery gates, Samson, tongue out, running beside him. ‘You must come now, Sir John, to the Tower! The clerk, Alcest, he’s had a seizure! Master Colebrooke says it was unexpected.’
Athelstan rapped out a few orders to Watkin and Benedicta.
‘I’ll take you across,’ Moleskin the boatman volunteered.
Sir John accepted the offer and within a few minutes they were all hurrying along the alleyways of Southwark down to the waterside. They clambered into Moleskin’s boat, Samson immediately going to stand in the prow, jaws half open, eyes closed, enjoying the cool evening breezes.
‘I’m sure that bloody dog has a mind of its own!’ Cranston murmured. He glared at Moleskin sitting opposite him, pulling at the oars.
‘We meant well,’ Moleskin replied. ‘We did, Sir John. We can’t let Brother Athelstan leave.’
‘Silence now!’
Athelstan stared up at the darkening sky.
‘Master Colebrooke appears to have been too hard.’
‘No, no, I’ve heard it happen before,’ Cranston replied. ‘Alcest was a clerk. Sometimes it’s the young and apparently strong who succumb, not to the physical pain, but the mental torture. Alcest will not be the first, and certainly not the last, to die of fear.’
Cranston and Athelstan sat back as Moleskin guided his wherry past grain barges, fishing smacks, skiffs, some with lantern horns already hung against the gathering gloom. At last they reached the Tower. Moleskin, eager to please, took them along the quayside and promised he would wait for them. Cranston, Athelstan and Flaxwith clambered out but Samson refused to leave.
‘Treacherous cur!’ the bailiff whispered.
‘I don’t think so,’ Athelstan replied. ‘Moleskin always carries a sausage in his pouch and, if I can smell it, so can Samson.’
They made their way along the pebbled path and across the moat. The gates were closed but a sentry, carrying a torch, opened a postern door and then led them along the narrow lanes on to Tower Green. Colebrooke was waiting, sitting on the steps of the great Norman keep.
‘You were too hard on him!’ Cranston barked.
‘Sir John, we’d hardly begun,’ Colebrooke replied, getting to his feet. ‘I had him manacled to a wall. The questioners applied a burning iron to his arm and suddenly he jerked like a doll, blood pouring through his nose. He’s hardly conscious. I’ll take you to him.’
Cranston told Flaxwith to remain outside as they followed Colebrooke down mildewed steps into the dark, sprawling maze of the Tower dungeons. They found Alcest in one of these, lying on a bundle of clean straw. Athelstan crouched down by the makeshift bed. He noticed a bruise high on Alcest’s right cheek and the blood crusting around the nose at the corner of the mouth. The clerk’s hands and feet were cold as ice. Athelstan felt for the blood pulse in the man’s neck: it was slow and weak. The friar pointed to a tallow candle on the table.
‘Light that!’ he ordered.
Colebrooke did so, as well as the sconce torch on the wall above the door. He handed the candle to Athelstan, who let the flames burn for a while then blew it out, putting the wick under Alcest’s nose. The sharp, acrid fumes made the clerk stir; his eyelids fluttered.
‘Master Alcest,’ Athelstan whispered into his ear. ‘Master Alcest, you are very ill, perhaps even dying.’
‘A priest,’ Alcest murmured. ‘Father, I have such pains in my head. God’s judgement, such terrible pains! I have had them before. Sometimes at night,’ he stammered. ‘Father, I can’t feel my feet or hands, it’s so cold and dark.’ His eyes closed. ‘Shrive me, Father. Shrive me before I die.’
Athelstan looked over his shoulder. ‘Leave us,’ he ordered.
Cranston followed Colebrooke back along the passageway; they went out on to the green where Flaxwith was staring mournfully in the direction of the river.
‘I’m sorry, Sir John,’ Colebrooke confessed. ‘But I’ve seen it happen before. Sometimes, even before battle, a blood pulse breaks in the head or neck; there’s a loss of feeling in the lower limbs.’
‘Do you have a physician?’ Cranston asked.
‘A leech but he’s a drunken sot and at the moment is lying in his chamber. He could hardly open a door, let alone examine a man!’