Field of Blood

the severed heads of traitors and riVer pirates. They entered the shadows of the bridge, the wherrymen pulling their oars in as the river gathered speed, carrying them by its own force under the arch and out to the other side.
    A short while later they reached the Southwark quayside and clambered out. Sir John strode along the lanes, shoving people aside, Athelstan and Crim bustling behind him. Athelstan expected to find the yard in front of St Erconwald's busy and thronging but it was deserted. Only Bonaventure slept like some lazy sentry on the top step of the church.
    'She's in the house,' Crim explained. 'She said she hadn't told anyone. She wanted to show you first.'
    'Jack, you needn't have come!' Athelstan said.
    'Brother, if you find it exciting, so do I, Anyway, I like to see Benedicta.'
    The widow woman opened the door and gave a gasp of surprise as Sir John embraced her, kissing her loudly on the cheeks.
    'You are a lovely woman, Benedicta, and what's all this clamour about?'
    Benedicta was certainly excited. She had taken her veil off, her raven-black hair tumbling down to her shoulders. She skipped away from Sir John, clapped her hands and pointed to the parchment littering Athelstan's table.
    'It's the grimoire,' she explained, taking a seat at the top. 'Now, when William Fitzwolfe, the former priest, had this bound he used parts of the old blood book and different parish records to stiffen the binding.'
    Athelstan sat down at the table. Benedicta had undone the red binding which held the grimoire together, loosened the pages and pulled these apart.
    'It was when I looked at the cover I noticed how thick it was.'
    Athelstan picked it up. It was nothing more than a strip of leather laid out flat and strongly reinforced with a thick wadge of parchment glued together at the edges and then placed against the leather to strengthen it. He leafed through the pages. He saw entries: 'Fulke, son of Thurston the labourer and Hawisia his wife…' Athelstan smiled: that was Watkin's father. Page after page was filled with these faded, scrawled ink entries made by successive priests over the years.
    'Now, look at this!' Benedicta took the pages from him and pointed to one entry already marked with a piece of ash from the fireplace. 'If you check again, Brother, you will find that these two women are the great-grandmothers, respectively, of Joscelyn the tavern-keeper and Basil the blacksmith. They were apparently married on the same day.'
    Athelstan read the entry on Agnes Fitz-Joscelyn and Ann, daughter of William the warrener.
    'They definitely had different fathers,' Athelstan said. 'But they are described as "sorores", sisters, in the marriage entry.'
    'Ah yes.'
    Benedicta took the parchment from him. She leafed through and showed another entry. This time the page had a title, written neatly by a learned clerk: 'The Confraternity of St Erconwald'. The first column listed 'brothers of the Confraternity', the second a similar list of 'sisters'. Agnes Fitz-Joscelyn and Ann, daughter of William the warrener, were grouped together as 'sisters'.
    Sir John, who had been looking over his shoulder, chuckled.
    'You've told me about this problem, Brother.' He tapped the parchment. 'And there's your answer. In my treatise "On the Governance of this City", I have come across many such confraternities. At one time they were very strong in different parishes. The Confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament, the Confraternity of the Angels, the Confraternity of St Luke.'
    Athelstan gazed wistfully at the piece of parchment.
    'It's a very good idea,' he said. 'And there must have been one here: the Confraternity of St Erconwald's. What I suspect happened is this. Agnes and Ann were bosom friends: that's apparent from the fact that they married on the same day. They were also members, perhaps leading ones, of the parish confraternity. They called each other sister. When the blood book disappeared there was no explanation for why they did this. The Venerable Veronica was speaking the truth. These two women lived and died many years ago. All Veronica could remember is that they called each other sister, hence the mistake.'
    'Benedicta!'
    The widow woman backed away from Sir John who came, arms stretched out, towards her.
    'You should have been a coroner. I mean, after all, you can't be a friar.'
    'Benedicta,' Athelstan echoed. 'Your sharp eyes and keen wit have made two young lovers very, very happy'
    'Will that mean there's going to be