Cranston's abrupt questions, the equally abrupt answers and the snapping and crackling of the logs in the fire. What did this group fear? he wondered. What was the meaning of the riddles?
'Tell me,' Athelstan spoke up, 'did anything happen in the household to account for these riddles? Anything in Sir Thomas's life? Sir Richard, Lady Isabella… you were the closest to Sir Thomas.'
'I don't know,' Sir Richard muttered. 'My brother liked to speak in riddles, refer to shadowy things, lectures and parables. He was a man who loved secrecy for secrecy's sake and hugged such secrets to his chest like other men do gold, silver or precious stones. No, nothing special happened here.'
'Are you sure?' Cranston turned and looked at him, resting his cup on one large, plump thigh. 'Are you sure, Sir Richard? My memory fails me about specific details but was there not a death here eight months ago?'
Lady Isabella's face now paled and Sir Richard refused to look up.
'No!'
'Come, come, sir,' Cranston barked. 'There was something.'
'Yes,' Lady Isabella said softly, 'Sir Richard's memory fails him.' She looked at Sir John more guardedly, as if realising the coroner was not the fool he liked to appear. 'There was Eudo's death.'
'Ah, yes, Eudo,' Cranston repeated. 'Who was he?'
Sir Richard looked up. 'A young page boy. He fell from a window and broke his neck, out there in the courtyard. No explanation for the fall was ever given, though Sir Thomas believed he may have been involved in some stupid jape. The boy was killed outright, head smashed in, neck broken.'
Cranston drained his cup and beamed in self-congratulation, giving a sly grin at Athelstan, who glared back. He wished the coroner had told him about this!
'Yes, Eudo's death. I was ill at the time with the ague but I remember the verdict being recorded. Poor boy!' Cranston murmured. 'This house has ill fortune.' He stood and took in his audience with one heavy-lidded stare. 'I urge you all to be most careful. There is a malignancy here, an evil curse. It may yet claim other lives! Lady Isabella, Sir Richard.' He bowed and stepped out of the chamber.
Athelstan stopped at the door and looked back. The group sat quite still as if bound by some secret.
'Sir Richard?' Athelstan asked.
'Yes, Brother?'
'May I have permission to visit the garret where Brampton died?'
'Of course! But, as I have said, his corpse has been sheeted and removed to St Mary Le Bow.'
Athelstan smiled. 'Yes. But there is something I must see.'
He asked Cranston to wait for him outside and went upstairs. On the first landing he stopped and stole a glance down the Nightingale Gallery, so engrossed he jumped when Allingham suddenly touched him on the shoulder.
'Brother Athelstan, can I help you?'
The merchant's long face was even more mournful and the friar was sure the man had been crying.
'No, no, Master Allingham, I thank you. You have heard of Vechey's death, no doubt?'
The merchant nodded sorrowfully.
'Poor man!' Athelstan muttered. 'You know of no reason why he should take his life?'
'His was a troubled soul,' Allingham replied. 'A troubled soul, vexed and tormented by his own lusts and pleasures.' He paused. 'The only puzzling thing was that he kept muttering, 'There were only thirty-one, there were only thirty-one'. '
'Do you know what he meant?'
'No. When we went into Sir Thomas's chamber yesterday, I heard him mutter.' Allingham screwed up his eyes. 'Vechey said, 'Only thirty-one, I am sure there were only thirty-one.' I remember it,' he continued, 'because Vechey was puzzled, upset.'
'Do you know to what he was referring?'
Allingham pursed his lips.
'No, I don't, Brother. But if I find out, I shall tell you. I bid you adieu.'
He proceeded down the wooden stairs and Athelstan went along the gallery and up to the garret. He pushed the door open and wished he had asked for a candle. The chamber was dark and dank. Athelstan shivered. There was a sinister atmosphere, a feeling of oppressive malevolence. Were the church fathers right, he wondered, when they claimed that the soul of a suicide was bound eternally to the place where he died? Did Brampton's soul hover here, as he would for eternity, between heaven and hell?
He stepped in and looked around. The table was now clear of its ghastly remains, the floor had been swept clear of its litter. It looked tidier, neater than it had the previous day. What had he seen here that afterwards had jolted, pricked against his memory? Something which had been out of place? He leaned against the wall desperately trying to clear his mind but the memory proved elusive. He sighed, looked round once more and went back to rejoin Sir John.
The coroner was fretting, hopping from foot to foot, standing close to the wall of the house, well away from the ctowds which now thronged the entire thoroughfare of Cheapside. He pulled Athelstan closer.
'They are lying, aren't they, Brother? There's something wrong, but what?'
'I don't know, Sir John, but there may be many logical explanations. Something may be wrong but they may not realise it. Something may be wrong but only one or two may know the truth. Or, finally, something may be wrong but known to someone outside the household.'
'Such as who?'
Athelstan looked round and lowered his voice. 'My Lord of Gaunt or even Chief Justice Fortescue. After all, he did lie; the Chief Justice said he left the house about curfew but Sir Richard claims it was much later.'
Sir John rubbed the side of his face.
'Yes, Chief Justice Fortescue. We don't even have a good reason for his being there. Why should he be visiting a London merchant?' The coroner grinned evilly, biting his lower lip with his strong, white teeth. 'I look forward to putting that very question to our Lord Chief Justice, but now for refreshment. Oh!' Cranston grinned and tapped his wallet. 'I've taken the small phial of poison Brampton's supposed to have used.' He tapped the side of his nose. 'I've an idea, but not now. What I need now is a drink!'
CHAPTER 4
Athelstan cringed. He had hoped Sir John's appetite had been curbed but he seemed both insatiable and unable to learn from previous experience. The friar followed him dolefully across the street as Sir John scampered direct as an arrow for the Holy Lamb of God. Cranston took to its dry, dark warmth as a duck to water. He waddled amongst the customers, using his not inconsiderable bulk to force a way through pedlars, tinkers, labourers and farmers fresh from the countryside, spending the profits of their produce on large stoups of ale.
Sir John commandeered a table in the corner, greeting the ale wife as if she was a long lost sister. The lady looked like a female incarnation of Satan. She had a hooked, perpetually dripping nose, skin as rough as a sack and bleary, bloodshot eyes. She munched continuously on her gums and her fingers were dirty and greasy down to the knuckles. Her cloak of Lincoln green covered a red kirtle which hung a few inches above tallow-smeared shoes. Athelstan looked at her and prayed to God to forgive him for all he felt was disgust. She, with her wide hips, dirty grey hair and face as wrinkled as a pig's ear, looked as blowsy as any harridan from hell. Athelstan sat looking at her in wonderment, constantly marvelling at the difference in women, contrasting this hag to the beauty of Lady Isabella. He grimly reminded himself that his vow of celibacy had certain consolations.
Cranston, however, acted as if she was an old friend, flattered and fussed her. She winked wickedly back at him, slyly insinuating that she would satisfy all his wants.
'Enough of that, you wicked wench!' Cranston teased. 'Food and ale first, then other comforts perhaps.' He dropped one eyelid. 'Later.'
The ale wife went away cackling and came back to serve both of them huge tankards slopping over with ale and a shared platter of meat mixed with onions and leeks swimming in a sea of grease. Cranston stuffed his mouth. He downed one tankard and, when the friar nodded, helped himself to the second.
'You are not eating, Brother?'
Athelstan toyed with the food on the platter in front of him.
