‘I am sorry?’ Prior Alexander’s voice seemed hoarse and dry.
‘Richer, you are persuasive. Kilverby had his doubts but something other than your honeyed words influenced both him and Master Chalk.’
Richer half-smiled, as if he was playing a chess game and was acknowledging a cunning opponent.
‘Anyway.’ Athelstan sighed. ‘Kilverby asked what could he do? He distanced himself from the Wyvern Company. He probably promised you the bloodstone. Of course all this did not happen at once. I suspect it took almost the first two years of your stay, Richer, before you were able to reap your hidden harvest and send it home.’ Athelstan glanced quickly at the abbot and his woman; their fearful faces showed he was close to the truth.
‘Which was what?’ Prior Alexander asked.
‘Oh, you all know. Kilverby offered reparation of a different kind; influenced by Richer, he made very generous donations to this abbey on one condition.’
‘Which was?’ Prior Alexander whispered.
‘All the goods plundered from St Calliste were to be gradually returned. You, Abbot Walter, agreed to this in order to swell the coffers of your beloved kinswoman. Prior Alexander, you cooperated out of your great love for Richer. .’
‘I. .’
‘Please, Brother, why lie? What you feel is not my business.’ Athelstan pointed at the Frenchman. ‘Richer, you were delighted. You weren’t sending messages home but the objects listed in this ‘Book of Gifts’: cruets, crucifixes, sacred items not to be entrusted to simple river folk but specially selected emissaries who, with Prior Alexander’s full connivance, you met with on your visits to the city. I’m sure most of these objects are now gone.’
‘We could prove. .’ Prior Alexander protested but his voice faltered.
‘What?’ Athelstan moved in his chair. ‘How you still have these items? Of course you could produce a crucifix, cruets, a triptych and claim they were those from St Calliste. One chalice looks like another, yes, but,’ Athelstan tapped the ledger, ‘give me the “Liber Passionis Christi”.’ His invitation was greeted with silence. ‘Well,’ Athelstan declared, ‘where is the Book of the Passion of Christ? I suspect it’s a manuscript written by Pope Damasus — yes? This too has gone back to France. Richer gave it to some trusted envoy on a foreign ship, well?’
‘The book has been returned.’ Prior Alexander was flustered. Trying to regain his dignity, he glanced sharply at Richer. ‘The book has been restored to its proper owner.’
‘With the permission of the Crown,’ Athelstan asked, ‘did you make a copy?’ Athelstan demanded, ‘Well, did you?’
Richer simply spread his hands, Prior Alexander slipped further down his chair.
‘There’s no “Liber”, no copy,’ Richer muttered.
‘I might insist on searching this abbey, including your chamber, Richer.’
‘You can’t. .’
‘We can and we might,’ Cranston retorted.
‘The Passio Christi,’ Athelstan asked, ‘do any of you know where the bloodstone is?’
‘No,’ Richer’s voice was restrained, ‘I swear, no!’
‘The Passio Christi,’ Athelstan got to his feet, ‘and the book about it hold the key to all this mystery, and the question which lies at the very heart of it: why did Sir Robert change so radically? There was more to that than his own scruples or your eloquence, Richer.’
‘I cannot help you on that!’
‘Never mind.’ Cranston rose and stood over the Frenchman. ‘You, Brother, whoever you may be, are confined to this abbey. Any attempt to flee will be construed as a treasonous act.’
‘I’m a Frenchman.’
‘And His Grace, King Richard,’ Cranston thrust his face down, ‘also claims to be King of France. Richer, you are confined to this abbey under pain of treason. Brother Athelstan?’
The coroner and friar stepped out of the chamber. Once they’d left the courtyard Athelstan paused.
‘Perhaps we should begin now, Sir John.’
‘Begin what?’
‘Our search!’
Cranston agreed. He and Athelstan adjourned to the library. Richer joined them. Athelstan told him to stand aside, yet even as they searched Athelstan realized they would find nothing amongst this precious collection of books. Richer was cunning. Should they, Athelstan wondered, demand that the sub-prior’s chamber also be searched? But, there again, the Frenchman was now alert to the danger. Moreover, although the ‘Liber Passionis Christi’ might prove very useful, its disappearance did not prove Richer, or anyone else, to be an assassin or a thief. Athelstan sighed as he placed the last book, a copy of Lucretius, back on the shelf.
‘Sir John, I’m ready!’ The firedrake in all his garish glory marched into the library. Cranston smiled at Athelstan and both followed this eccentric character out through the cloisters to Mortival meadow where the abbey chandler waited.
‘I’ve everything prepared.’
The firedrake pointed to a barrel with a capped tallow candle on its upturned end. The firedrake struck a tinder, sheltering its flame against the boisterous cold breeze. The wick flared into life. The firedrake hastily withdrew. The tongue of flame danced even though it was protected by the concave-shaped cap. Cranston stamped his feet impatiently; almost in response the candle dissolved in a burst of angry, spitting flames. Small tongues of fire shot up to land, hissing like snakes on the frost-hardened grass. The top of the dry wooden barrel caught light, flames licked down its side already smouldering from the spits of fire. Soon the entire barrel was alight. Athelstan thought the flames would die but then a fresh burst flared up, angry shoots of fire leaping so swift and fierce the entire barrel was soon reduced to blackened wood crumbling away in fiery fragments.
‘You see.’ The firedrake was almost dancing with glee whilst the abbey chandler beamed at the dying fire. The monk abruptly remembered what he was doing and hurriedly pulled a more mournful face. ‘That’s how Brokersby died,’ the firedrake declared.
‘Do explain,’ Cranston insisted.
Athelstan sniffed the grey-black smoke and walked closer to the dying fire. The tang of oil was strong, needle-thin rivulets of smoking blackness scored the frozen grass.
‘Very simple.’ The firedrake breathed in the smoke as if it was the very incense of heaven.
‘Then keep it so,’ Cranston retorted, ‘and brief. I’m freezing.’
‘Come, come,’ the chandler insisted on taking them back to his own work shop, a large chamber which reeked of oil, cordage and wax. He made them sit on stools around a brazier which sparkled just like a ruby. Athelstan, clutching the cup of posset the chandler served, ruefully wondered on the whereabouts of the bloodstone.
‘Very simple.’ The firedrake held up a large tallow candle. He turned this upside down tapping its base. ‘You hollow this out and pour in oil, perhaps add some salt-petre powder, the type used by the King’s newfangled cannons — you’ve seen them at the Tower?’
Cranston grunted.
‘Reseal the candle with a wax plug and you have nothing less than a vase of oil.’
‘If you light the wick,’ Athelstan agreed, ‘the flame burns down, the wax dissolves and the conflagration begins. The lower the oil sits in the hollowed-out candle, the longer it takes.’
‘I’ve seen it done,’ the chandler observed ruefully. ‘Sir John, as coroner, you must have encountered tallow-makers, candle-fashioners who use cheap materials within a shell of wax?’
‘I have,’ Cranston drank from his posset cup, ‘which explains why the guild’s regulations are so stringent against such a practice.’
‘That and more,’ the firedrake explained. ‘This barrel was as dry as tinder. Inside it was a small pouch of oil. The false candle was perilous enough but the oil would make it truly dangerous. You must have seen conflagrations; people forget how fast flames can move. I’ve seen fires in dried forests course swifter than a fleeing deer. Burning oil is even worse.’ He waggled a finger. ‘Very dangerous — it turned our candle into a fountain of spitting flame.’