The physician winked at Athelstan. ‘When I received Sir John’s invitation, I made careful study of the cause of death.’
‘And?’
‘Well, if it’s arsenic, particularly red arsenic, we might well see what the populous would call a miracle. Let me surprise you, Father.’
The physician went and watched the labourers as their spades and picks began to ring hollow as they reached the coffin lid. More earth was dug out. Athelstan peered round the graveyard and shivered. The shadows were growing longer. The birdsong had stilled. Nothing except the grunting of the labourers and the shifting of earth broke the eerie silence.
‘Why are these places so quiet?’ Athelstan murmured. He strained his ears: he could just hear the sound of chatter and laughter as the traders and tinkers on the other side of the church cleared away their stalls.
‘We are ready. Sir John!’ the physician called.
‘Then pull it out, lads!’
One labourer jumped down into the grave on top of the coffin, ropes were attached and, after a great deal of heaving and cursing, the faded, dirt-covered coffin was hoisted out of the earth. Cranston thanked the labourers and told them to go and rejoin Father Odo. He pulled out his long dagger and began to prise open the coffin lid. Athelstan watched attentively as the clasps were broken. The lid creaked open slowly, almost as if the person inside was pushing it up and threatening to rise. He pushed his hands inside his sleeves, closed his eyes and muttered a prayer.
It’s God’s justice, Athelstan thought. This is God’s work.
The last clasp broke free. Cranston lifted the tattered winding sheet. Athelstan opened his eyes as he heard Cranston’s gasp. The physician was kneeling beside the lid of the coffin, carefully examining the inside.
Athelstan drew a deep breath and walked over and looked down in the deep wooden coffin. The friar stared in stupefaction at the corpse’s face; fatty, white and waxy as if fashioned out of candle grease. Nevertheless, it was free of any corruption; the dead woman’s features were quite pretty, oval-shaped and regular, with a generous mouth and aquiline nose.
‘For God’s sake!’ Athelstan breathed. ‘She’s been dead three years! Corruption should have set in!’
CHAPTER 13
The physician touched the face carefully then ran his hand inside the coffin. When he brought it out Athelstan could see it was covered by fine red dust.
‘Nothing remarkable,’ the physician observed dryly. ‘You see, Brother, arsenic is a subtle deadly poison, particularly red arsenic. Its only weakness is that the corpse, after death, reveals the presence of this deadly substance for corruption is halted.’ He tapped the coffin. ‘I have seen such cases before. The fine red dust, the lack of putrefaction, indicates this poor woman was fed red arsenic over a considerable period of time.’
‘What happens now?’ Athelstan asked. He gestured at the corpse. ‘There’s our evidence.’
‘I will take an oath,’ the physician replied, ‘and so will Sir John and yourself about what we have seen here. That will satisfy any justice.’
‘In which case,’ Athelstan said, sketching a blessing in the air above the corpse, ‘may she rest in peace now that God’s justice and that of the King will be done.’
He and Cranston re-sealed the coffin. The labourers re-interred it and, after thanking a sleepy Father Odo as well as Master de Troyes, Cranston and Athelstan walked slowly back down the Ropery into Bridge Street. The cordwainers, ropemakers, the sellers of tents, string, hempen and flax, had put away their stalls. A street musician played bagpipes whilst a drunken whore cavorted in a crazy dance. The beggars, both real and professional, were crawling out of their hideaways, hands extended for alms, whilst a little old woman, a battered canvas bag in her hands, was busy sifting amongst the rubbish heaps.
The taverns were full as traders celebrated a week’s work, but after that eerie graveyard and the wickedness he had seen, Athelstan felt tired and depressed. From a casement window above him a baby cried and a young girl began to sing a lullaby, soft and sweet through the warm evening air.
‘We are surrounded by sin, Sir John,’ Athelstan sombrely remarked. ‘As in the blackest forest, everywhere we look we see the eyes of predators.’
Cranston belched, stretched and clapped the friar on the shoulder.
‘Aye, Brother, and the evil buggers can see ours. Look, cheer up, murder runs in all our veins, Brother. You said that yourself: the Inghams, the bloody business of the Guildhall, and now the Hobdens. Life, however, is not only that. Listen to the mother singing to her baby. Or friends laughing in a tavern. What you need, Brother, is a cup of claret and a good woman.’ Cranston grinned. ‘Or perhaps, in your case, a really bad one!’
Athelstan smiled back but then his face became sombre again.
‘What shall we do about the Hobdens? We have no proof they killed Sarah.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake, Brother, you are not thinking straight. I can prove they did. The bitch Eleanor actually admitted, in my presence, that she tended to the sick woman. Who else would approach her? Do you Know what I think, my good monk?’ Cranston helped himself to another swig from the wineskin. ‘Walter Hobden is a man of straw who met and fell in love with the darling Eleanor. They then put their heads together. Walter began feeding his poor wife a few grains of arsenic. She falls ill and dearest Eleanor is brought in to tend to her. The poisoning continues apace.’
‘Wouldn’t the physician detect it?’
‘Not really. Increased stomach cramps, lackluster appearance. Anyway, the majority of physicians couldn’t tell their elbows from their arses!’ Cranston scratched his red, balding pate. ‘What the great mystery is, Brother, is how the young girl knew? Not only that her mother was poisoned but the actual potion used. Didn’t she say her mother told her in a dream?’
Athelstan nodded and shivered at the cold breeze wafting in from the river.
‘Do you believe that?’ Cranston urged.
‘Sir John, every morning I take a piece of bread and, according to faith, turn it into the risen body of Christ. I believe that. A baby is born in Bethlehem who is both man and God, and I believe that. The same boy becomes a man who is crucified but rises in glory from the dead, and I believe that.’ Athelstan looked squarely at the Coroner. ‘And I am told that the Spirit blows where it will and that God’s justice will be done. And so, My Lord Coroner, if I can believe all that, I can believe young Elizabeth’s story. The human mind is subtle, Sir John. Perhaps she had her suspicions and so the seed was sown.’
Athelstan blew out his cheeks. ‘God knows what happened then. All her life centred on the fact that her mother had been poisoned and so she entered in to an alliance with her old nurse. Perhaps the latter knew something of potions. Whatever, they devised their little game to force the weak-willed Walter into confession or at least remorse. Anyway, what shall we do now, Sir John?’
‘Oh, I’d let them stew in their juice for a few days. Meanwhile, I’ll visit the girl at the Minoresses.’
‘Thank you, Sir John, and then?’
‘As I said, I’ll return home and swear out a warrant for the arrest of Walter and Eleanor Hobden. My constables can serve it, and before they are much older the Hobdens will both stand trial before the King’s Justices at Westminster.’
Athelstan thanked him again, assuring the Coroner that he would study all the evidence regarding the murders at the Guildhall, and so they parted, Cranston going up to the Minoresses and Athelstan turning down towards London Bridge.
‘Ite missa est.’ Athelstan extended his hand in blessing at the end of the Sunday Mass. He smiled as those of his congregation who knew a little Latin shouted back ‘ Dei gratia ’.