feet.
‘My Lord Coroner has made his point,’ Athelstan tactfully intervened. ‘Boscombe doesn’t even know how to hold a dagger. Like Sir John, Sir Gerard was a fiery man. He, not to mention his dogs, would have put up some resistance. More importantly, My Lord,’ Athelstan addressed Gaunt, ‘if Boscombe had struck a dagger so deep, he’d bear blood-stains on his hands and sleeves. But,’ he added, helping Boscombe to his feet, ‘there are no such stains.
Gaunt stared heavy-lidded at Athelstan, then at Boscombe. He sighed and blew out his cheeks, dug into his purse and flicked a coin at Boscombe who, despite his nervousness, deftly caught it.
‘Master Boscombe, a grave injustice has been done. Wait over there!’
He scuttled away as fast as a rabbit to sit with the two great wolfhounds. Gaunt walked towards Cranston and Athelstan, rubbing his finger round the rim of his cup.
‘If Boscombe didn’t do it,’ he whispered, ‘then who did?’
Athelstan and Cranston stared back.
‘More importantly,’ Gaunt continued, ‘how was it done? The garden is enclosed. Mountjoy was a soldier, guarded by dogs. We have examined his wine cup. He was not drugged, so how did someone get so close to kill such a man?’ Gaunt wagged a finger at Sir John. ‘You, My Lord Coroner, and your clerk will be my guests at tonight’s banquet. You are under orders to resolve this matter, and do so quickly.’ He looked over at his companions. ‘Sirs, we must leave this matter in the capable hands of My Lord Coroner.’
‘Have you resolved the other business?’ Goodman spitefully called.
Cranston blushed with anger at the laughter this provoked. Sir Nicholas Hussey, whom Cranston secretly respected, looked embarrassed.
‘What business is this?’ Gaunt asked.
‘Oh,’ Goodman brayed, walking forward, ‘the heads and bloody parts of traitors filched from London Bridge and other places. Sir John has been trying to catch the thief for weeks.’
Athelstan would have liked to have smacked the Mayor full in his red, fleshy face but instead looked down and hoped Cranston would not give vent to his fiery temper. Sir John did not disappoint him. He stepped forward, his face only a few inches away from Goodman’s.
‘I shall not only resolve that matter,’ he whispered, yet loud enough for the others to hear. ‘But, I assure you, sir, when this business is finished there will be fresh heads on London Bridge!’
They all made to leave and were about to re-enter the Guildhall when Boscombe ran forward to crouch at the Regent’s feet.
‘My Lord!’ the man wailed, raising a tear-streaked face to John of Gaunt. ‘What shall I do now? My master’s dead. The dogs?’
‘Do you have a position?’ Gaunt asked the Mayor.
Goodman shook his head. The Regent shrugged.
‘Then, Master Boscombe, you should count your blessings. You are at least free.’
‘And the dogs?’ he wailed.
‘Perhaps they should join their master. Unless, of course,’ Gaunt glanced sideways at Cranston, ‘My Lord Coroner stands maintenance for all three of you?’
Cranston stared at the pathetic little man and the two huge wolf hounds who looked so resigned to their fate. He was about to refuse but then caught Goodman’s smirk and the doleful eyes of the hounds.
‘I’ll stand maintenance!’ he retorted before Athelstan could urge prudence.
Cranston pulled Boscombe to his feet, whistled to the dogs and marched away through the Guildhall, grinning evilly from ear to ear as the hounds charged after him, scattering that group of powerful, haughty men.
CHAPTER 3
‘Lady Maude will kill me!’ Sir John muttered as he and Athelstan sat on a garden bench watching the two great wolf hounds, who had already terrified the life out of Cranston’s household, bound round the garden. Every so often they would come back and place their great paws on the Coroner’s fat legs to lick his face until the garden rang with Cranston’s ripest curses.
Boscombe, needing no second bidding, had gathered his pathetic belongings into a bundle and followed Sir John home. He now appeared at the door, washed, changed and bearing a brimming goblet of claret.
‘Good man! Good man!’ Cranston murmured. ‘You are already high in my favor.’ He wagged a stubby finger at his new steward. ‘Five things matter to me,’ he growled. ‘First, the Lady Maude. She is to be obeyed in all things. Second, take care of my sons, the poppets. Third, Brother Athelstan,’ he tapped the friar gently on the arm, ‘is my friend. Fourth, my study where I keep my great treatise is my sanctuary. And, fifth, my wineskin. There are two in fact; one hanging behind the buttery door, the other in my chamber. They are to be kept full at all times but the Lady Maude is never to know there are two.’
‘Of course, Sir John.’ Boscombe disappeared as silently as he’d appeared.
Cranston sipped the claret. ‘He will be a good man,’ he murmured. ‘But what about those bloody dogs, eh? Satan’s balls, Athelstan, they look big enough to eat the poppets and Lady Maude in one gulp!’
Athelstan chewed his lower lip. He could see Sir John’s problem but not even the glimmer of a solution.
‘It will all depend,’ he said slowly, ‘on what Lady Maude decides, Sir John.’ He held back the laughter. ‘If you are lucky, she’ll just put the two dogs out of doors. If she’s angry, you may go with them!’
Cranston belched. The two dogs turned and looked towards him.
‘Hell’s teeth, boys!’ Cranston growled at them. ‘What shall I call you? Do you know, that snivelling bastard Mountjoy, God rot him, didn’t even bother to give you names? Well, I have thought of two: the one with the blue collar will be called Gog and the one with the red, Magog.’
The two dogs must have thought it was time once again to thank their new master for they came hurtling back towards him. Athelstan felt his heart lurch with fear but Cranston lifted his hand and the two dogs stopped and lay panting before him, their eyes never leaving his fat, florid face.
‘Where did you get this gift with dogs? They’d eat out of your hands,’ Athelstan asked, carefully putting his feet under the bench.
‘Ever since I was knee-high to a buttercup I’ve got on with dogs,’ Cranston replied. ‘My father was a hard man. When I did wrong, he put me out in the kennels.’ Ever reluctant to discuss his youth, he pointed to the writing implements on the table in front of Athelstan. ‘But it’s not as difficult as this problem, eh?’
Athelstan picked up his crude drawing of the Guildhall garden. ‘How?’ he muttered, conscious of Cranston breathing noisily in his ear. ‘How could such a murder occur?’
‘Never mind that,’ growled the Coroner. ‘Let’s think about who? Hell’s tits!’ he muttered, answering his own question. ‘The possibilities are legion, and amongst them that group of whoreson codpieces who richly deserve a hempen necklace round their necks!’
Athelstan stared at the Coroner. ‘I didn’t know you cared so much, Sir John?’
‘They are,’ Cranston continued, getting into his stride, ‘a group of foul, wrinkled, double-speaking, painted turds!’ He knocked Athelstan’s piece of parchment aside and crumbled the remnants of the piece of bread he had been nibbling. ‘At the Guildhall this afternoon, my dear monk…’
‘Friar, Sir John!’
‘Same thing!’ he mumbled. ‘This afternoon we met the finest collection of rogues who ever graced this kingdom.’ Cranston placed one lump of bread on the table. ‘We have the Guild masters, the devil’s own henchmen. So full of oily grease, if you set a torch to them they’d burn for ever. They hate each other, and resent the Crown whilst each and all would love to control London. Any one of these or all together could have murdered Mountjoy.
‘Second,’ another lump of bread appeared on the table, ‘we have Gaunt’s party. God knows what that subtle prince is up to. He may desire the Crown or at least to be its master. He wants to control the London mob and needs the Guildmasters’ gold to achieve this. Next,’ a third piece of crust appeared, ‘we have the King’s party. Now our young prince is not yet of age, but followers like Hussey would love to break the power of the Regent and replace him with their good selves. Then we have the Great Community of the Realm, the peasant leaders with
