The Anger of God

immediately.
    ‘You know what we are looking for, just keep that bloody thing away from me! I have a horror of ferrets. I knew a man once who allowed one to get inside his hose. He ended up being castrated!’
    Ranulf grinned as he stroked the inquisitive ferret between the ears. The ferret gazed unblinkingly at Cranston .
    ‘Oh, bloody hell!’ the Coroner said.
    ‘Sir John, if you are really afeared,’ Ranulf replied, pointing to a small bench, ‘perhaps it’s best if you stand on that.’
    Cranston gazed suspiciously at him but Ranulf remained sombre-faced.
    ‘Lord Coroner, I always advise nervous patrons to do that.’
    ‘You’d best do as he says, Sir John,’ Athelstan added with a smile. ‘You know how Bonaventure loves you. Ferox may be of the same ilk.’
    Cranston needed no second bidding but stood like a Colossus on the small bench. He leaned his back against the wall, fortifying himself with generous mouthfuls from the miraculous wineskin. Ranulf held Ferox to his lips and whispered in his ear.
    ‘What are you doing?’ Cranston bellowed.
    ‘Telling him what to do.’
    ‘Oh, don’t be bloody stupid, man!’
    Ranulf carefully put Ferox down on the floor boards. For a few minutes the ferret sniffed before darting like an arrow beneath the great four-poster bed. Athelstan went across to the small table and picked up the unstoppered earthenware jug.
    ‘You say this contained the foxglove?’
    Cranston , his eyes intent on the bed, just nodded.
    ‘And you say it was found knocked over and the medicine drained?’
    ‘Yes, yes, Brother, but leave that. What’s that bloody ferret up to?’
    Cranston got his answer. Suddenly there was a violent scuffle under the bed and Ferox emerged, his small snout bloodied as he dragged a fat, long-tailed, brown rat out into the open.
    ‘Good boy!’ Ranulf whispered.
    ‘The bloody thing’s as stupid as you are, Ranulf!’ Cranston roared. ‘He’s not here to kill bloody rats but find dead ones!’ Ranulf picked up the dead rat, opened the window and tossed it into the street. Again Ferox went hunting. The minutes passed. Athelstan watched the industrious little ferret and tried not to look at Cranston who, having taken so many swigs from the wineskin, was beginning to sway rather dangerously on the bench. Ranulf kept picking the ferret up and putting it under cupboards and behind chests. Sometimes the ferret would return, other times there would be an eerie scuffling, a heart-stopping scream, and he would re-emerge with a rat. Athelstan had to look away as Cranston began to bellow imprecations. On one occasion Rosamund came and rapped on the door. Cranston roared at her to bugger off and instructed his ‘grinning monk’, as he called Athelstan, to bolt the door.
    At last Ranulf was finished. Ferox was put back in his cage. Cranston came down from his perch and all three began to move the bed and bits of furniture, Ranulf even lifting floor boards, but they could find nothing. Eventually, all three went, red-faced and perspiring, to stand in the centre of the room. Cranston ’s elation was obvious. He clapped both Athelstan and Ranulf on the shoulder and apologized for bellowing at Ranulf.
    ‘I’ll buy you the best claret in London !’ he swore. ‘And a drink for your little friend.’
    ‘He likes malmsey, Sir John.’
    ‘Well, as far as I’m concerned, he can have a bloody bath in it! But you are sure?’
    Ranulf nodded.
    ‘In which case, we should try the jar.’
    He went across, took up the small jug and, using his wineskin, filled the jug to the brim, then raised it to his lips.
    ‘Sir John, are you certain?’
    ‘Oh, for God’s sake, Athelstan, I am about to find out. ‘ He drank from the jug, draining every drop from it. ‘ Alea jacta ! ‘ he declared. ‘The die is cast! Let’s see the bitch downstairs.’
    They all trooped down to the solar where a tight-faced Rosamund and a much more nervous Albric sat waiting for them.
    ‘Sir John.‘ The woman got to her feet. ‘You have been a good hour in my house. Now get out!’
    ‘I haven’t finished yet,’ he snapped, advancing within a few inches of her.
    ‘Why, what else do you want? These ridiculous allegations!’
    Cranston breathed in deeply. ‘Rosamund Ingham, and you Albric Totnes, I, Sir John Cranston, King’s Coroner in the city, do arrest you for murder and treason!’ Rosamund went white and gaped. Albric slumped down on the chair, clutching his belly, wet-eyed and