going up to his chancery.
He now sat with the Coroners’ Roll in front of him though his gaze strayed to the thick manuscript lying to his right: Cranston’s famous treatise, ‘On the Governance of London’. Sir John leaned back on the cushioned chair. He had reached a new chapter, ‘On the keeping of the streets, alleyways and runnels free of all filth’. Cranston had recommended the building of public latrines, strict laws against filling the streets with refuse and the contents of chamber pots. The open sewers would be moved beyond the city limits whilst the dung-collectors would be organised into a guild.
Sir John sighed and returned to more mundane matters, the first entry on the Coroners’ Roll:
On Thursday, the morrow of the feast of St Joachim and St Anne, Richard Crinkler sat on a latrine high in his tenement in a house owned by Owen Brilchard on the corner of Bore Street. The said latrine did break and the aforementioned Richard fell to his death which was not his proper death.
Sir John scratched his cheek. Why did his clerk use such convoluted phrases? And how could a man fall to his death down a latrine? Cranston closed his eyes and recalled the old, rotting mansions in Bore Street.
‘Ah yes,’ he murmured.
He could visualise what had happened to poor old Richard Crinkler. Those great houses had small cupboards which served as stool rooms built into a shaft which ran the whole length of the house. Grinkler had either been half asleep or drunk. The wooden latrine board had broken and so Crinkler fell to his death.
‘Heaven be praised!’ Cranston whispered. ‘We all have to die but sometimes the Good Lord does call us in rather strange ways.’
He started as he heard the bell of St Mary Le Bow begin to toll, the sign that the night curfew was over. He put his quill back in its box and blew out the candle. Grabbing his war belt and cloak he hurried down into Cheapside. The broad thoroughfare was still deserted. Any beggars, nightwalkers or whores who had been lurking in the mouths of alleyways soon disappeared once they heard the news that the lord coroner was on the streets. Cranston walked down towards St Mary’s. The beacon was still alight in the steeple. Cranston studied the cavernous doorway to the church and smiled as he glimpsed Henry Flaxwith with the ever-vigilant Samson.
‘Good morning, Sir John,’ the bailiff called, grasping the rope holding Samson more tightly.
‘Is everything ready?’ Cranston asked and looked in surprise as a small side door opened and Athelstan came out. ‘Lord, Brother, what are you doing here?’
‘Praying, Sir John, I’ve been praying!’
Athelstan had washed and shaved and wore a new robe but his eyes looked as if he had slept badly or not at all.
‘Is everything well?’
‘Everything, Sir John. I said a very early Mass not long after midnight, when the tumult in the cemetery had died down. I’m too angry with my parishioners to meet them.’ Athelstan breathed in. ‘They can spend a day without their priest.’
‘Don’t judge them too harshly.’ Cranston patted Athelstan on the shoulder. ‘God knows why they are doing it.’
‘Did you get my message?’ Athelstan asked, abruptly changing the subject.
‘Yes,’ Sir John replied. ‘I went to see Master Lesures: timid as a rabbit, crouching in his chamber. According to him, Alcest sometimes acted the fop and insisted on wearing spurs to his boots.’ Cranston whistled through his teeth. ‘And I want to question Alcest further. There’s been another death: Napham.’
‘I thought there might. How did he die?’
‘A caltrop had been hidden among the rushes in his chamber, a huge, jagged affair…’
‘A caltrop, Sir John?’
‘They are used against armoured knights,’ Cranston explained, seeing the puzzlement in Athelstan’s face. ‘Steel man-traps, often placed on roads when planning an ambuscade or used to defend a dry ditch during a siege. Simple but terrible, like a rat-trap. The horse or the man puts his foot in and the trap is sprung.’
‘A terrible death,’ Athelstan remarked.
‘It almost severed Napham’s foot,’ Cranston continued. ‘However, in his agony he must have knocked a candle over. It fired the rushes and bedstead in his chamber. The poor man burnt to death. Another tenant noticed the flames and the fire was put out. The chamber was on the ground floor and the floor was made of stone so the fire did not spread too quickly. I went to view Napham’s corpse.’ Cranston shook his head. ‘Nothing more than burnt meat, the horrible caltrop still buried in his foot.’
‘And the assassin?’
‘Probably got in through a downstairs window,’ Cranston replied, ‘to place the caltrop, which can be bought at any ironmongers or armourers.’
‘And the riddle?’
‘Oh yes, Napham didn’t see this when he went into his chamber: it was pinned on the wall above the door. My next,’ Cranston closed his eyes to recall the riddle, ‘my next is like the flesh on the tail of a stag.’ He opened his eyes. ‘N, of course, is the last letter of venison.’
Flaxwith broke in. ‘Sir John, we must be going. The scrimperers will be waiting.’
‘The what?’ Athelstan exclaimed.
‘The scrimperers.’ Cranston grinned. ‘My lovely little boys from Rat’s Castle. I’m going to catch the Vicar of Hell.’
‘In which case,’ Athelstan said, ‘we can talk as we walk.’
And the coroner, striding across Cheapside, listened attentively as Athelstan told him, not only about William the Weasel’s message, but also of the strange occurrence outside Benedicta’s house the previous evening.
‘Devil’s futtocks!’ Cranston stopped. ‘Devil’s futtocks!’ he repeated.
‘My sentiments exactly, my Lord Coroner,’ Athelstan replied. ‘But perhaps I wouldn’t use your words. I’ve been wondering, Sir John, why the Vicar of hell should be so keen to distance himself from the murders amongst the clerks. I also wonder where Master Alcest was last night and why he’s now so interested in Mistress Alison.’
‘Devil’s futtocks!’ Cranston repeated.
‘Sir John?’
‘I forgot my miraculous wineskin.’ Cranston flailed his hands. ‘I knew there was something…’
‘Sir John!’ Athelstan felt like roaring in exasperation. ‘Have you heard what I said?’
‘Of course, dear monk.’
‘Friar, Sir John.’
‘Precisely. The Vicar of Hell has sent me a message. You think Alcest is the murderer and he now has an interest in Mistress Alison. I, however, have forgotten my bloody wineskin! Anyway, do you think Alcest is the murderer?’ Cranston asked, hurrying on.
‘I do. I also know how Stablegate and Flinstead killed their master!’
Cranston stopped again; this time Flaxwith and Samson almost crashed into him. The coroner grasped Athelstan by the shoulders and kissed him on each cheek.
‘Marvellous monk!’ he bellowed, then hurriedly stepped aside as a window opened and the contents of a chamber pot came spluttering down. The filthy contents narrowly missed them. Cranston shook his fists. ‘I’ll have you arrested!’ he roared.
He hurriedly grabbed Athelstan and pushed him forward as the shutters opened again and another chamber pot was emptied, this time spattering poor Samson who stared up and growled his defiance.
‘The scrimperers?’ Athelstan asked.
‘Wait a minute.’ Sir John stood aside as a huge dung cart piled high with the previous day’s rubbish made its way down the alleyway.
‘The scrimperers,’ Cranston explained, ‘are a group of very small men. Really, they are dwarves. They live in a house in that mean tangle of alleyways near Whitefriars. I call them the “Lords of Rat’s Castle”. Now, they’re the most godforsaken of people. No one trusts them, no one likes them. Now and again they are hired by some lord or a travelling mummers’ troupe as acrobats or jugglers.’
‘Like Master Burdon on London Bridge?’
‘Oh no.’ Cranston shook his head. ‘These are even smaller. They have the bodies of children and the faces of very old men.’
He jingled his purse. ‘They are not averse to a little housebreaking, stealing through gaps where others
