about! You were the only one who saw me take down the proclamation pinned to my door by Ira Dei.’ Athelstan rounded on him. ‘In fact, I suspect you put it there. And that’s fine, Pike. You play your stupid, dangerous games of revolt and building God’s kingdom here in London. But, tell me, do your fellow communards, does the Great Community of the Realm, does Ira Dei know you are a traitor? John of Gaunt’s spy?’ Athelstan walked back. ‘And what would happen to you, Pike, if they found out, eh? How does your secret society treat traitors?’
Pike stood with hands hanging helplessly and Athelstan’s anger began to drain away at the sheer terror in the man’s face and posture. The priest pushed his face close to the ditcher’s.
‘For God’s sake, Pike, I baptized your children! I give you the sacrament. I admired you, working from dawn to dusk for a mere pittance to feed your family.’ Athelstan drew his breath. ‘You are not like me, Pike. I have no family to worry about. But you are a good worker, a good husband, a good father. For God’s sake, why play the Judas with a man who is not only a priest but your friend? Couldn’t you trust me?’
Pike flailed his hands ineffectually as tears coursed down his dirty cheeks.
‘Oh, for God’s sake!’ Athelstan muttered. ‘Pike, I don’t mean to threaten you. Your secret’s safe with me. Not even Sir John knows.’
The ditcher shuffled his feet. ‘It’s not like that, Father.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Three months ago,’ he replied, ‘I and a few others from Southwark were listening to that mad priest — you know, the one with the fiery cross, outside St James Garlickhythe. Then the soldiers came and we were arrested. I had a choice: pay a fine or become Gaunt’s spy. The fine would have crushed me and…’ His voice trailed off.
‘And what?’
Pike looked up defiantly. ‘Don’t believe everything you hear, Father. I am not one of your zealots. Oh, at the beginning I was, but not now. Not when they talk of slaughter, of killing every priest, of burning the good with the bad.’ He laughed sourly. ‘It’s not difficult, Father, to betray something you don’t believe in any more. And as for my Lord of Gaunt, he had discovered I am not the most capable of spies. So, I tell him about a notice pinned on the door of the church. Or that a member of the Great Community of the Realm has visited Southwark, three days after the man has left. Don’t worry, Father, Gaunt never profits from what I tell him.’
Athelstan looked at the great, burly ditcher standing there, hanging his head. You represent the common man, Athelstan reflected, caught between the demons who want to destroy everything and those who wish to keep everything. Athelstan walked forward, hands extended.
‘I am sorry. You are no traitor, no Judas!’
Pike grasped his hand. ‘Can you help me, Father?’
Athelstan pursed his lips.
‘Yes, I think I can. But it will take time. Meanwhile don’t do anything rash, man. And…’
‘And what, Father?’
‘What do you know of Ira Dei?’
Pike laughed. ‘Father, I am a very small leaf low down on a very tall tree. I don’t even know who the rebel leaders are. No one knows who Ira Dei is. He comes, shrouded in darkness, delivers his message, and just as mysteriously leaves. He could be anyone. The Lady Benedicta, Watkin, even Sir John Cranston!’ Pike grinned. ‘Though I think people would recognize him. Father, I know nothing. I swear on the life of my children!’
‘But could you get a message to him?’
‘I could tell certain people. Why?’ Pike’s face became concerned. ‘Father, take care. Have no dealings with such violent men, be they nobles or peasants. Do you know what I think? It’s a fight between the rats and the ferrets over who will rule the chicken run.’
Athelstan smiled, touched by Pike’s concern.
‘The message is simple. Say Athelstan of St Erconwald’s would like to meet Ira Dei.’ He made Pike repeat the message.
‘Is that all, Father?’
‘Yes, it is. I have kept you long enough. I am sorry for my temper.’
Pike shrugged. ‘You get what you deserve, Father. But you will help me?’
‘Of course!’
‘I’ll never forget, Father.’
Pike disappeared. Athelstan thought of the ditcher’s gangling son, deeply in love with Watkin’s daughter, and stared at Bonaventure, who had been watching them with close attention.
‘Well, well, my cunning cat,’ he whispered. ‘Perhaps Sunday morning won’t be so terrible after all, eh?’
Athelstan stared round the church and remembered his promise to another parishioner. He locked St Erconwald’s and hurried through the streets to Ranulf the rat-catcher’s house, a small, two-storied tenement on the corner of an alleyway. The pale pinch-faced rat-catcher was waiting for him. His brood of children, all resembling him, gathered behind their father at the door to welcome the priest to their house. As Athelstan entered the darkened passageway, he recalled that Ranulf was a widower whose wife had died in childbirth five years previously. Ranulf, his brood trailing behind, ushered Athelstan into his small solar or working shop. Athelstan sniffed as he sat on the stool. With the ratcatcher on the chair opposite, children around him, eyes intent on the priest.
‘Do you like the smell, Father?’
‘Why, yes, Ranulf, it’s not offensive.’
Ranulf patted his black-tarred jacket. ‘I rub aniseed and thyme into this. Rats like that.’
He paused as his eldest daughter, dressed in a ragged black dress, solemnly served Athelstan and her father pots of tasty soup. As she did so, the friar gazed round: in one corner was a cage with sparrows; in another hung fishing lines, a badger’s skin, lead bobs and eel hooks.
‘Do you like rats?’ Ranulf suddenly asked.
Athelstan stared back.
‘There are four types, Father. Barn rats, sewer rats, river rats and street rats. The worst are the sewer rats — they are the black ones.’ He pulled back the sleeve of his tarred jacket, displaying an arm badly pocked with the marks of old wounds ‘The black rats are bastards, Father. Sorry, but they are real bastards! I have been dead near four times from bites. I once had the teeth of a rat break in my finger.’ He extended his hand. ‘It was terrible bad, swollen and rotted. I had to have the broken bits taken out with pincers. I have been bitten everywhere, Father.’
Athelstan jumped as a small, furry animal, which seemed to come from nowhere, ran up the rat-catcher’s leg and sat on his lap.
‘This is Ferox,’ Ranulf announced, ‘my ferret.’
Athelstan stared in disbelief at the creature’s little black eyes and twitching nose.
‘Ferox means ferocious.’ Ranulf continued, not giving Athelstan a chance to speak. ‘Now, ferrets are very dangerous but Ferox is well trained. He has sent at least a thousand rats to their maker.’
Athelstan hid his grin, finished his soup and handed the bowl and pewter spoon back to the girl. The rest of Ranulf’s children stood staring at their father with eyes rounded in admiration. The priest looked at the ratcatcher’s slightly jutting teeth, pointed nose and white whiskery face, and recalled his recent conversation with Pike. Ranulf was the same: a hard-working man, a good father, one of the small ones of the earth, so far from power and wealth and yet so close to God.
‘Ranulf, you wanted to talk to me about the Guild?’
‘Yes, Father, we’d like our Guild Mass at St Erconwald’s.’ Ranulf swallowed nervously. ‘The Guild would meet in the church and then we’d have our feast in the nave afterwards. If that’s all right with you, Father?’
Athelstan nodded solemnly.
‘Every month on the third Saturday we’d meet at St Erconwald’s for our Mass and use the nave for a meeting.’
Athelstan again nodded.
‘And we’d pay you two pounds, fifteen shillings every quarter.’
Athelstan guessed the rat-catcher thought the amount rather low.
‘That will be most satisfactory,’ he replied quickly.
‘Are you sure, Father?’
‘Of course.’
