The Anger of God

even a pig would despair of. What makes me angry, monk...’
    ‘Friar, Sir John!’
    ‘As I was saying, monk, what makes me angry is I know one or more of those bastards is a murderer. He must be!’
    Cranston would have continued his litany of curses but Athelstan guided him out on to the sun-washed steps of St Erconwald’s. He locked the door of the church and that of his house and, after grabbing his saddle and bag of writing implements, went to collect Philomel. Cranston, after taking two generous swigs from his wineskin, forgot what he termed the ‘Poxy Guildmasters!’ and returned to his perennial teasing of Benedicta. At last Athelstan was able to saddle a protesting Philomel. He slung his bag over the saddle horn and carefully mounted.
    Sir John collected his own horse from where it had been chomping the cemetery grass and swung himself into the saddle with such force that Athelstan winced; no wonder, he reflected, Crim called Sir John ‘Horse Cruncher’. Athelstan urged Philomel forward and, not the best of horsemen, almost careered into Sir John. The friar glared down at a grinning Benedicta and tossed her the keys to both the church and his house.
    ‘You’ll keep an eye on things, Lady?’
    Benedicta, biting her lip to stop her laughter, nodded.
    ‘And you’ll come back at Vespers?’
    Again the nod.
    Athelstan urged Philomel on and, with Cranston behind, blowing kisses at Benedicta, they left the churchyard and rode down towards London Bridge .
    ‘What’s happening at Vespers?’ Cranston abruptly asked.
    ‘We are going to meet the devil, Sir John. You, me and Benedicta.’
    Cranston belched like a trumpet blast. ‘What the hell do you mean, monk?’
    ‘Wait and see.’
    Any further conversation proved impossible; as it was market day, the streets of Southwark were full and Athelstan had to wave to different parishioners.
    ‘Greetings, My Lord Coroner!’ Pike the ditcher and Tab the tinker bawled as they sat outside a tavern, stoups of ale in their hands.
    ‘Sod off!’ he roared back, sensing the mockery in their voices.
    They passed The Piebald. Cranston looked longingly through its darkened doorways and closed his eyes as he smelt the savoury pies baking there. Athelstan, however, refused to stop. Eventually they had to dismount to get through a crowd clustering round a chaunter who was loudly reciting the news of the day.
    ‘The French made a landing at Rye and burnt the church! The Lord Sheriff is dead, struck through the heart in his own garden, as is Sir Thomas Fitzroy, dead and stale as many of the fish he sold. A witch has been seen flying over St Paul ’s and a boy with two heads has been born in a house near Clerkenwell!’
    On and on the chaunter went, reciting what he had learnt, a mixture of half-truths and lies. Athelstan and Cranston passed on. Near the bridge itself the vegetable markets were doing a brisk trade; people walking along with their eyes fixed on the goods, frowning thoughtfully. The stalls were packed with different types of vegetables: crimson love apples, bundles of white glossy leeks, celery with pink stalks and bright green tops, the white knobs of turnips and the rich brown coats of chestnuts. Stall owners shouted: ‘ St Thomas ’s onions!’
    ‘Leeks fresh from the garden!’ Porters forced their way through, teeth clenched, jerkins wet with sweat as they walked, half-bowed, under the overflowing hampers on their backs. A bird seller, his boots red with the soil of the brick field, stood by a pile of cages, selling linnets, bull finches, gold finches and even nests bearing eggs. A little girl, dressed in black rags, sold water cress from a small tub. She looked so pathetic Athelstan bought tuppence worth and Philomel munched it in the twinkling of an eye.
    Cranston and Athelstan, fighting to make their way, passed stalls selling cheese cakes, others combs, old caps, pigs’ feet; a hawker of knives, sharpening hatchets, shouted abuse at a market official trying to collect the tax. Whilst outside a tavern, the Pied Powder, a court sat to regulate, or at least try to, the running of the market. The air was thick with the smoke and odour from the tanners as well as the packed mass of sweaty bodies.
    ‘Hell’s teeth!’ Cranston breathed. ‘This is the devil’s own kitchen!’
    For a while they had to stop whilst a group of exasperated beadles tried to clear a legion of cats and stray dogs which had congregated around a stall which sold offal.