Athelstan rose to his feet and began to pace the kitchen. He crossed himself and intoned the ‘Veni Creator Spiritus’ for guidance. The Great Miracle could pose serious problems. The Bishop of London had made his decision and the case would be referred to synod of English bishops and then on to the Pope. If Rome agreed, St Erconwald’s would become an official place of pilgrimage, but what then? Athelstan tried to control his disquiet: his faith was a faith of miracles, yet he felt deeply uneasy about what was happening. If Sir John was suspicious, he was even more so. The same unease disturbed his mind about the grisly murders carried out after the execution of Lady Isolda. Why had they happened? Was the Ignifer someone who passionately believed the dead woman was innocent? Yet the burden of proof, Athelstan conceded, lay heavily against Lady Isolda. She was certainly no innocent lamb despatched to the slaughter. Of course, there was the mysterious Vanner, but Athelstan was almost convinced the clerk was dead and not in hiding. Undoubtedly, the Ignifer knew about Greek fire and might even possess ‘The Book of Fires’. From the little Athelstan had learnt, once the secret formulas were known it was easy to manufacture that liquid death. Nevertheless, murders of Sutler, Gavelkind and Tressilian were beyond him, brief moments in time leaving very little, if any, evidence to study. But the attack on Lady Anne? He and Cranston had been with her and Turgot when that shadowy assassin had slipped out of the darkness. Who could move so swiftly? Athelstan pulled a face. Virtually everyone he’d questioned. Some of these regarded Lady Isolda as guilty but two men passionately believed in her innocence, Garman and Falke. One of these, or both, could be the Ignifer. And what about others, were they telling the truth? Sir Henry, Buckholt, even that pretty-faced maid, Rosamund? Athelstan crouched next to his great tomcat. ‘It’s possible, Bonaventure, that any one of these might be a murderer. As for why, it’s in the past,’ he murmured. ‘Somewhere deep in this tangle of human souls sprouted a root which has waxed strong and poisonous. I am the gardener, Bonaventure, me and Sir John, heaven help us. This tangle is thick and thorny – it will take time to uproot and that means more deaths.’ Athelstan straightened up. ‘Ah, well, it’s time to see what is happening in my church.’
Athelstan fastened his sandals, donned his cloak, pulled up its deep hood and slipped out into the night. The cemetery and the great enclosure before the church were busy. Cresset torches glowed on the end of poles or were stuck into wall crevices. Makeshift braziers crackled their heat. Bonfires fed with rubbish flamed the darkness. The pilgrims and visitors gathered close to these to warm themselves or to cook scraps of meat pushed on to ready-made skillets, pans or prongs. The air bubbled with the stench of sweaty bodies, roasting meat and wood smoke. The noise was constant. A babble of voices broken by the occasional hymn, shouted psalms as well as noisy salutations, laugher, curses and oaths. People swarmed in and out of the church under the watchful eye of Bladdersmith and his comitatus of bailiffs. Benedicta and other women of the parish assisted. Imelda, Pike’s wife, a true virago, stood on the top step of the church directing people as well as collecting pennies in a sealed wooden box with a slit on top. All the denizens of Southwark and beyond had crawled out of their rookeries and mumpers’ castles, or what Cranston called ‘the Dungeons of Darkness and the Halls of Hell’. They’d all assembled to make a profit: apple-women, watercress-sellers, onion pickers with their produce slung on ropes around their necks; vendors of sheep and pig’s trotters pushed and shoved by milk and water men. Poachers from the fields around, garbed in hare and rabbit skins, offered the pink, glistening flesh of their quarry hanging from poles over their shoulders. Boners and grubbers who scoured the midden heaps and simplers who foraged for herbs, mushrooms, snails and grubs offered their potions along with chunks of cat meat. Despite the late hour, this ragged, motley garbed mob surged backwards and forwards, desperate to sell to the pilgrims pushing their way up and down the church steps. Jongleurs, troubadours, firedrakes, puppet masters along with street musicians tried to entertain the crowd. Men-at-arms from the Tower and the gatehouse at the Bridge swaggered around trying to catch the eye of the orange-wigged whores who, under the pretence of prayer and pilgrimage, solicited ever so quietly for custom.
Athelstan walked through God’s Acre. He stopped to check on Godbless and Thaddeus. Both were fast asleep, so he made his way carefully out into the enclosure, past bothies and tents set up by the pilgrims. He entered the church. More people thronged there, going up and down the transepts or queuing for entrance to St Erconwald’s chapel. Everyone paused to admire Fulchard’s crutch, now discarded but given pride of place, hanging above the saintly bishop’s tomb. Fulchard, flanked by an ever-so-demure Cecily the courtesan on one side, her sister Clarissa on the other, sat in a throne-like chair before the rood screen so pilgrims could touch and talk to him in return for an offering placed in a sealed box at his feet. Athelstan sketched a blessing in the air and passed quietly on, praying for guidance as he wondered how long this feast of miracles would last. He left the church and took a vantage point on the top step, staring over the concourse and the people milling there. The friar studied the crowd carefully and felt a chill of apprehension as he noted the large number of young, able-bodied men who moved amongst it. Intrigued, he went back into the church and stared around. Crim and the ladies of the parish were busy arguing, assisting and organizing, but Athelstan couldn’t glimpse Watkin, Pike, Ranulf and the rest of that coven of mischief. He left the church, pushing his way through the crowd. He strode swiftly down the lane, past Merrylegs’ darkened pie shop and stopped beneath the garish sign of the Piebald. He was about to knock on the door when a man stepped out of the darkness; the meagre light from a lanthorn hanging on its hook glittered in the blade of a half-drawn dagger.
‘Who are you and what do you want?’ The guard slid between Athelstan and the door.
‘The Archangel Gabriel,’ Athelstan snapped. He pushed the man aside and rapped on the obviously locked door. The guard came back just as the door swung open and Watkin stepped into the pool of light.
‘Why, Father?’
‘Why, Watkin?’ Athelstan mimicked back. ‘Please tell this gentleman to leave your priest alone.’ The guard hastily withdrew. Athelstan stepped into the warm mustiness of the taproom. The chamber lay in darkness except for the ghostly pool of light cast around the great common table on which Merrylegs senior, garbed in his funeral clothes, lay stretched out, his bare feet sticking up, his grizzled head and thin-lined face almost hidden by the corpse wimple wound tightly about. The corpse’s closed eyes were sealed by two coins, whilst a small wafer of bread rested between his bloodless lips. Votive candles, about sixty in number, ringed the corpse. Along each side of the table sat the men of the parish with Watkin at the top and Pike seated at the other end. They all clutched tankards of Joscelyn’s choice ale and used the blackjacks to hide their faces as Athelstan walked across to greet them with a blessing.
‘Father,’ Pike started to rise and the others followed suit, ‘we are having a funeral vigil.’
‘I am sure you are.’ Athelstan smiled. He glanced around. They were all there, even the hangman, along with a number of hard-faced, solemn-eyed strangers. Athelstan decided not to stay. He realized this was no funeral vigil. This was a meeting of the Upright Men from this ward and probably every other in Southwark. He talked quickly about the arrangements for the requiem Mass tomorrow, blessed the gathering and left. Once outside, Athelstan walked halfway along the lane and stared up at the slit of starry sky.