The Grail Murders

messages here and there, but nothing in particular.'
    'Why did you do it?' Benjamin gazed at the man. 'Why should a tailor become involved with some mad, treasonable monk? Especially a man like you, Taplow, who accepts the reformed doctrines of Luther?' Taplow's eyes fell away.
    'Once I was a Catholic,' he stuttered, 'till my wife died. Hopkins was the only priest who cared.'
    I stirred, forgetting the discomfort in the cell, as I caught my master's suspicions. Something was wrong here. Taplow was filthy, but looked well fed and, for a man facing a horrible death, too calm and serene. 'Did you take messages to anyone else?'
    He shook his head. Benjamin stretched across and grasped the man's hand.
    'Master Taplow,' he whispered, 'there is very little I can do for you except make sure the gaoler gives you your wine, pray for your speedy death and that in Purgatory Christ will have mercy on your soul.'
    'Aye,' Taplow whispered. 'Let my Purgatory be short.' Then he went back to lie down in the corner of the cell.
    We hammered on the door for the gaoler and returned to the main gates of the prison where Benjamin left a coin and instructed the sadistic bastard to do what he could for poor Taplow. Then we left, through the old city gates, skirting its wall as we hastened along alleyways and runnels down to the river quayside at East Watergate. Benjamin hardly spoke but kept muttering to himself. Only when I ordered the boatman to take us to Syon did my master break free of his reverie.
    'Strange, Roger,' he remarked. 'Here we are. We have just witnessed an old lady's strangling and a silly tailor imprisoned in squalor who, in a few hours' time, will be burnt horribly to death. Death seems everywhere,' he continued, 'and red-handed murder is a constant visitor in our lives.'
    I sat and let him brood. Indeed, looking back over the years, I have become surprised, not that people murder each other but that, given our love of bloodshed, they don't do it more often. Anyway, I just tapped my boot against the bottom of the boat and looked over the river, busy with huge dung barges emptying their putrid waste in midstream. Benjamin stayed lost in his own thoughts but I caught his unease. Old Wolsey loved to lead people by the nose, in particular his nephew and myself, and relished his little games of sending us unarmed into darkened chambers full of assassins. (Just wait until I've finished this story and you'll see what I mean!)
    At last we reached the great Convent of Syon, its gleaming white stone crenellations peeping above a green fringe of trees. We disembarked and made our way up a gravel path, through the gatehouse and into the guest room. The white-garbed nuns fluttered around us excitedly, pleased to welcome visitors to their famous house. A beautiful place Syon, with its cool galleries and passageways, high-ceilinged chambers and pleasant gardens. Mind you, this was no ordinary convent. The nuns were some of the best doctors in Europe and saved many a person from death but old Henry put paid to them, flattening the convent and pillaging its treasures. The great bastard!
    A lovely house Syon, whose occupants tended the sick and brought about many a cure. Mind you, they could do nothing for Johanna, the love light of Benjamin's life. I have mentioned her before: the daughter of a powerful merchant, seduced and abandoned by a great nobleman whom Benjamin later killed in a duel. Johanna, however, had become witless, her beautiful hair streaming down about a pallid face, her mouth slack, her eyes vacuous.
    Whenever Benjamin was in London he always visited her. He would sit and hold her, rocking her gently to and fro as if she was a child whilst she, muttering gibberish, rubbed salt into his wound by believing he was the nobleman come back to claim her. The meetings were always heart-wrenching. I could never stand and watch so would walk away to wink and flirt with the young novices. At last Benjamin would drag himself away and Johanna, screaming for her lost love, would be taken away by the gentle sisters. This time was no different and my master left Syon with the tears streaming down his face. As usual he grasped my hand.
    'Roger,' he urged, 'if anything should happen to me, swear you will protect Johanna!'
    And, as usual, I would swear such an oath. Oh, don't worry, I kept it! Years later when The Great Bastard pulled down the monasteries and emptied the convents I took Johanna into my own home. Indeed, I have made her