He tried to speak again, but rapidly changed it to a whisper, which seemed to come out more clearly. ‘What the hell happened, for Christ’s sake? Who did this to me?’
‘You were ambushed, but he got away,’ growled Gwyn. ‘When I catch him, I’ll tear his liver out with my teeth!’
The older Benedictine laid a hand gently on the coroner’s shoulder. ‘Don’t try to talk until this bruising of your voicebox wears off, my son. We’ll give you some potions to ease it, as your clerk said.’
John reached up tentatively to feel the back of his head, as he was aware of an ache there.
‘Yes, you have a lump there too, John, some bastard gave you a nasty whack!’ said Ranulf cheerfully. ‘But it’s your clerk to whom you should be grateful, he was the hero of the hour!’
De Wolfe’s bloodshot eyes swivelled to look at Thomas de Peyne, though he took the advice to avoid speaking.
‘The little fellow probably saved your life,’ chortled Gwyn. ‘That’s usually my job, but he beat me to it this time.’
John risked some gargling noises which were obviously a demand for more explanation and the Cornishman began it.
‘Just before I returned from a wasted search on the marshes behind the canon’s house, Thomas here said he was uneasy about you going off to meet some mysterious informant, so he decided to follow you down to that chapel place.’
He nudged the priest to get him to continue and Thomas, wriggling with embarrassment, reluctantly described what happened.
‘I was concerned that you went alone to meet this unknown person, Crowner, even though you took your sword. There might have been half a dozen Brabançons waiting to jump on you.’
He paused and shivered at the memory of his own desperate intervention. ‘So I followed a couple of minutes later and was in time to see this evil man strike you down with a club, then slip a cord around your neck and start strangling you.’
Gwyn guffawed and slapped Thomas on the back. ‘Damn me if the little devil didn’t attack the assailant, though he was twice his size, according to Thomas!’
‘I had to do something, didn’t I?’ snapped the clerk indignantly. ‘I owe my life to Sir John, I couldn’t just stand by and see him murdered! There was a big brass cross on a long staff leaning against a wall, so I took it and struck the man with the heavy end. I’m afraid I snapped it, though it was already bent.’
The infirmarian gave a benign smile. ‘I’m sure God — and Abbot Postard — will forgive you for that! It seems appropriate that a priest like yourself should use the emblem of Our Lord to save a life!’
The other cleric — who John later discovered was Gerard, one of the two chaplains who ministered at St Stephen’s — also approved of Thomas’s attack with an ecclesiastical weapon. ‘That was an old cross going back to Stephen’s time, it was beyond repair anyway!’
John reached out and gripped Thomas’s shoulder. ‘Once more, I have to thank you, good friend!’ he croaked, determined to show his gratitude, however painful his Adam’s apple might be.
His clerk’s embarrassment was mixed with happy pride in having been able to repay some of his master’s kindness in giving him a job when he was destitute several years ago, but de Wolfe cut short his contentment with husky whispers.
‘But did you see who the swine was, Thomas? Who did this to me?’
‘I saw him clearly, Crowner, but I have no idea who he was,’ Thomas bleated. ‘He was a large, rough man, a labourer or perhaps a mercenary soldier. I have never seen him before — though I certainly would know him again!’
‘You were fortunate that he did not turn on you as well,’ said Ranulf. ‘You told us he let go of the coroner’s garrotte and fled.’
Thomas nodded, a rather sheepish expression on his face.
‘I suspect it was the screams I made that scared him off, rather than my feeble attempts to injure him,’ he admitted. ‘Though I did manage to cut the back of his head when I caught him with the brass crosspiece of my weapon,’ he added proudly.
The chaplain, Gerard, cut in at this point. ‘I heard the yells from the entrance to the chapel above, as I was going in to prepare for the next office,’ he explained. ‘I shouted lustily down the steps to ask what was happening and the next thing I knew, I was being shouldered aside by this large lout, who dashed up the stairs and promptly vanished through the outside door on to the river walk.’
‘And you didn’t recognise him, either?’ asked Ranulf.
Gerard shook his head. ‘My brother Thomas’s description is accurate, he was a rough-looking villain with coarse features. All I recall was that he had a hairy mole on his cheek.’
‘We made a search of the palace and the yards as soon as we were told about the assault,’ said the guard sergeant. ‘But many minutes had passed by then and we had only a vague description of who we were seeking amongst all the crowds that come and go in the palace.’
‘It was the same with that swine who knifed Basil,’ growled Gwyn. ‘He vanished into thin air, for this place is like a rabbit warren, with doors and passages everywhere.’
Ranulf laid a hand gently on de Wolfe’s shoulder. ‘Why should anyone want to murder you, John? This was a deliberate trap, luring you down to that crypt, then jumping you from behind.’
The coroner’s reply was delayed by a young novice coming in with a pewter cup which he gave to the infirmarian, who held it to John’s lips. It was a posset of mulled wine sweetened with honey and immediately had the effect of soothing the rawness of his throat, which had felt as if he had feasted on broken glass.
‘I brought it on myself,’ he whispered, in answer to Ranulf’s question. ‘I put it about that I was about to unmask the thieves who took the treasure and also made some hints about knowing of some foreign spies in the palace.’
The under-marshal roared with laughter, then apologised.
‘Sorry, but that’s rich! You put up a bluff and someone calls it with a club and a garrotte! You should join our gaming sessions, John, you would win a fortune.’
Thomas looked far more serious. ‘Do you really think it was that, master? Someone wanting to silence you?’
‘It seems likely,’ croaked John. ‘Why else would someone want me dead?’
‘Which one d’you think it was?’ demanded Gwyn, ready to seek out someone and tear off his head for harming his old comrade. ‘Was it over the treasure or this tale brought by Robin Byard?’
De Wolfe shrugged, finding that less painful than trying to speak, but any further discussion was ended by another young monk coming in with a steaming length of linen lying on a wooden tray. It was rolled like a large sausage and gave off a foul smell.
‘All of you must leave now, if you will,’ ordered the infirmarian. ‘I must apply this poultice of hot clay and herbs to Sir John’s neck. It will reduce the pain and swelling.’
He shooed the men out of the small cubicle and proceeded to wrap the poultice around John’s neck, where an angry red line caused by the ligature had cut into the skin around its full circumference.
‘It stinks!’ protested de Wolfe.
‘But not as much as you would stink in your grave, had not your brave clerk saved your life!’ retorted the Benedictine.
It was the following afternoon before de Wolfe was allowed to return to his lodging. He had suffered repeated applications of the poultice, as well as regular doses of the herbal honeyed wine. The tyrant of an infirmarian had also taken the opportunity to bleed him and purge his bowels, so that he was more than glad to escape, even though he readily admitted that the treatment seemed to have banished most of the pain in his throat and his voice was halfway back to normal.
Gwyn and Thomas came to collect him and take him back to Long Ditch, both solicitous in their efforts to assist him. He shrugged off Gwyn’s offer of an arm to lean on. ‘It’s my bloody head and neck that suffered, not my legs,’ he growled, but leavened the rebuff with a lopsided grin.