Murder most holy

relishing the neat terminology and clarity of thought. He finished the treatise and tapped the parchment with his fingers. ‘Brilliant!’ he murmured. ‘The Inquisitors are wasting their time. Brother Henry is original but no heretic!’
    He put the scroll down, stretched, then followed Sir John up to the bedchamber. The coroner was already fast asleep. For a while Athelstan knelt by his own bed, trying to clear his mind of different scenes, messages, fragments, all the events of the day. He wanted to pray, yet at the same time knew that today had been important. He had seen and heard things which were significant, but couldn't interpret them. He closed his eyes and felt himself drift. An hour later he woke to find himself slumped over the bed. Wearily he climbed in, falling back into a dreamless sleep.

CHAPTER 9

    Athelstan woke early the next morning. Cranston was snoring, dead to the world. Athelstan lay for a while. He felt warm and rested. Hearing the first chimes of the bell, he got up and, taking a towel from the wooden lavarium, went out across the mist-shrouded grounds to the monastery bath house. Here he washed and scrubbed himself, threw on his robe, then went back to the kitchen of the guest house, built up the fire and boiled some water in which to shave. He tiptoed upstairs, took out fresh underclothes and a robe from his saddle bag, then breakfasted on the scraps from the meal of the night before.
    He knelt for a while, saying his own office, keeping his mind clear and disciplined, before going across to celebrate mass in one of the side chapels of the monastery church. Other priests were doing the same, taking advantage of the time before Lauds to perform their own private office. After he had disrobed and thanked Norbert, who was serving as his sacristan, Athelstan went into the sanctuary behind the high altar, still sweet with the smell of wax candles and incense. As expected, he found a coffin resting on the great wooden pillars on the red carpet, the words ‘Brother Roger obiit 1379’ carved on the lid. Athelstan stroked the smooth pinewood coffin. Later in the day a solemn requiem mass would be sung and Brother Roger’s body laid to rest with other deceased members of the community in the great vault beneath the sanctuary.
    Athelstan stood there as other monks came in and knelt on the prie-dieu, making their own private devotions on behalf of their dead comrade. Athelstan waited until they had all gone, answering the call to Divine Office, before kneeling down himself, not so much to pray as to keep himself hidden from the rest of the community as they gathered in the choir stalls to chant the psalms. Athelstan stared round the apse, the huge, half-circular wall which ringed the back of the altar and the statues of the Apostles standing in their niches. Strange, he mused, Alcuin had been praying in this sanctuary when he disappeared, and his own sanctuary at St Erconwald’s held a great mystery. Athelstan looked once more at the statues of the Apostles. Concentrate, he told himself, leave St Erconwald’s alone! Alcuin was praying here, then he disappeared. Brother Roger used the phrase: ‘There should have been twelve’. To what did he refer? The friar studied the deep, wooden coffin and looked back at the wall. An idea occurred to him.
    ‘Nonsense!’ he whispered, and held his fingers to his lips. ‘Oh, my God, of course! Naturally.’ He crossed his arms to curb his excitement and patiently waited until the service was finished. When the rest of the community filed out to break their fast in the refectory, Athelstan hurried to the guest house.
    ‘Sir John!’ he shouted, bursting through the door. ‘ Cranston , you have slept long enough!’
    He heard a loud crash. The coroner came downstairs, thundering like a huge barrel.
    ‘By the devil’s tits!’ he roared. ‘Can’t a poor law officer sleep?’ He rubbed his sleep-soaked face and peered at Athelstan. ‘You’ve discovered something, haven’t you, you bloody monk?’
    ‘Yes, Sir John.’
    Cranston , tying the points of his breeches, padded into the kitchen. Athelstan realised it was the first time he had seen Sir John with his boots off: in his loose shirt, bulging breeches and stockinged feet, the coroner looked even more like one of his baby sons.
    ‘What are you smiling at, you bloody monk!’
    ‘Nothing, Sir John. Sit down.’
    ‘I’m hungry.’
    ‘Tell your belly to wait.’
    ‘Then some mead?’
    ‘Not on