The House of Crows

‘I left Dame Mathilda’s early,’ he confessed. ‘I went down to King’s steps and hired a barge.’

‘For where? Sir Francis, please tell me the truth.’

‘I went to the stews in Southwark, to the bath-house there.’

He gazed round, flushed, as his companions hid their sniggers behind their hands.

‘So, you were not tired from the evening’s exertions?’ Athelstan remarked drily. ‘Sir Francis, I am parish priest of St Erconwald’s: the bath-houses on the riverside are notorious brothels.’

‘So?’ Harnett’s face came up, his lips pursed. ‘I went there for refreshments, Brother, as probably do a great many of your parishioners.’

‘And then you came back,’ Athelstan continued, ignoring the insult.

‘Yes, I came back.’ Harnett shrugged. ‘What more can I say?’

What more indeed, Athelstan thought? He smiled to hide his despair: these men were lying, even laughing at him. Yet there was little he or Sir John could do to bring them to book. He glanced over his shoulder. Cranston had now moved to sit beside Coverdale. Athelstan coughed noisily because the coroner was now leaning slightly forward, eyes drooping. Oh, don’t fall asleep, Athelstan prayed. Please, Sir John! He felt they were treading a narrow, dangerous path; the slightest slip and these powerful knights would break into mocking laughter. They would declare they had nothing more to say and sweep out to continue their pleasures and other pastimes.

‘And Sir Henry Swynford,’ Athelstan almost shouted as he turned and walked back towards the knights. He hoped Sir John would stir himself. ‘And Sir Henry,’ he repeated just as loudly, ‘gave no indication that he had received the same artefacts as Sir Oliver Bouchon?’

‘No, he didn’t,’ Aylebore grumbled, ‘and I’m getting tired of this, Brother.’

‘And so none of you knows of any reason why he should have been murdered?’

‘If there was, we’d tell you,’ Malmesbury retorted.

‘What were Sir Oliver and Sir Henry supposed to remember?’ Athelstan asked.

‘If we knew,’ Sir Edmund sarcastically replied, ‘you’d know.’

‘You were all friends?’

‘More companions and neighbours,’ Aylebore replied.

‘But you were all Knights of the Swan?’ Athelstan asked.

For the first time he saw the mask slip: Malmesbury flinched whilst his companions stirred restlessly.

‘That was many years ago,’ Malmesbury muttered. ‘The foolishness of youth, Brother Athelstan. Times goes on. People change and so do we.’

‘So the noble Fraternity of the Knights of the Swan no longer exists?’ Athelstan asked.

‘It just died.’

‘When the friendship between you did?’ Athelstan asked.

‘Friar,’ Sir Humphrey Aylebore warned, ‘you are becoming impertinent.’

‘Brother Athelstan,’ Sir Thomas Elontius intervened kindly, ‘we all live in the same shire. We fought in the same battles. We marry into each others’ families. We meet for the tournament or the hunt. We laugh at weddings and mourn at funerals. We have our disagreements, but nothing to provoke murder between us.’

You are like Sir John, Athelstan thought, glancing at Elontius; despite your red hair and bristling beard, you are a kind man.

Sir Thomas held his gaze. ‘We know nothing, Brother,’ he whispered hoarsely, ‘of why these two good knights should be so foully slain.’

‘And the red crosses etched on the faces of the two corpses?’

‘Nothing,’ Malmesbury rasped.

‘In which case,’ Cranston declared, wheezing as he got up from the steps and ambling across the chapter- house floor, ‘my secretarius will write down what you have told us. You are innocents in this matter. You know nothing that could assist us. You are willing to swear as much on oath?’

‘Show us a book of the Gospels,’ Goldingham taunted, ‘and I’ll take my oath.’

‘In which case. .’ Cranston looked over his shoulder at Coverdale.

‘Festina lente,’ Sir Maurice Goldingham spoke up. ‘Hasten slowly, my lord Coroner.’ He spread his podgy hands. ‘We have sat here and answered your questions, but the fact remains that two of our companions lie foully slain. You and your friar have come here and, by your questions, insinuated that their assassin could be one or all of us. Yet,’ Goldingham got to his feet shrugging off Malmesbury’s warning hand, ‘these men were killed in London, in your jurisdiction, my lord Coroner. Both men, like us, spoke out strongly against the regent and his demands for fresh taxes.’ Goldingham pressed a podgy finger into Cranston’s chest. ‘Now people are beginning to whisper that they might have been killed by those who do not like such outspokenness.’ He pressed his finger even harder but Cranston did not flinch.

‘These men were our friends,’ Goldingham continued hoarsely. ‘Their blood cries to heaven for vengeance. You have been sent by the regent so I tell you this: if these deaths are not resolved and the assassin caught, I personally will stand at that lectern and tell the Commons that their murderers walk free because certain officers of the king are too incompetent to catch them, and that those same officers should be replaced.’

Cranston grasped the knight’s podgy finger and squeezed it until Goldingham winced. ‘I have heard you, Sir Maurice,’ he whispered, ‘and I call you a fool. I swear two things myself. First, I shall trap this murderer and watch him hang, his body cut down, quartered and disembowelled.’ The coroner raised his voice. ‘Secondly, the deaths of these men are shrouded in mystery, but you are all fools if you believe that they will be the last to die.’

CHAPTER 5

‘Thank God we are out of there!’

Cranston and Athelstan stood in the forecourt before the great doorway of the abbey. They had left the knights in the chapter-house, Cranston not waiting for any reaction to his warning. He had just spun on his heel and strode out, with Athelstan and Coverdale following behind. The captain of Gaunt’s guard had been grinning from ear to ear at the way Cranston had dealt with those powerful men. After they had passed through the cordon of soldiers, he was impatient to enjoy the representatives’ discomfort, and could hardly wait to whisper his goodbyes to Athelstan.

‘Did I do right?’ Cranston breathed in noisily.

He took out his wineskin, toasted the statue of the Virgin standing on a plinth next to the abbey door, and took generous swigs.

‘They threatened you, Sir John, and there was no need for that. However, Goldingham might be correct. We have no proof that Bouchon’s and Swynford’s killer is one of those knights.’

‘Bollocks!’ Cranston cursed. ‘They were telling a pack of lies. They sat there like choirboys or mummers in a play reciting lines.’

‘But that does not mean they are trying to hide anything about the murders,’ Athelstan insisted. He linked his arm through Sir John’s and guided him away. ‘You have met such men before, Sir John. You know their ways,’ he added flatteringly. ‘They grew up together, served as pages and squires in the same households. They are linked by blood and marriage. They go to war, share the spoils and, in peace time, stand shoulder to shoulder.’

‘Don’t speak in riddles, Friar!’

‘Come, Sir John, there is no riddle. You have just taken one swig too many of that wineskin. No, don’t glare at me. You’re father of the poppets, and glaring at me from under those bushy white eyebrows is only pretence. What I am saying,’ Athelstan continued, ‘is that of course those men have got a great deal to hide, but they may have nothing to do with the murders.’

‘So how do we find out?’

Athelstan poked the wineskin beneath Sir John’s cloak. ‘In vino veritas, Sir John. In wine there’s truth.’

‘You mean Banyard?’

‘Of course. Show me a landlord who says he doesn’t eavesdrop on his customers’ conversations and I’ll show you a liar.’

They made their way out of the abbey. They had to take a circuitous route through narrow, foulsome