The House of the Red Slayer

‘can you show me a man who isn’t?’
    Cranston’s return saved Athelstan from further embarrassment. The coroner swept his beaver hat from his head, scratched his balding pate, winked lecherously at Benedicta and turned to watch a now frightened taverner bring across a deep pewter bowl of sack and cups of wine for his companions.
    ‘You are not eating, Sir John?’
    ‘No,’ Cranston muttered. ‘I don’t feel hungry and I suspect the innkeeper, after my blunt speech with him, would poison the bloody dish!‘
    Benedicta laughed merrily. ‘Sir John, you must calm yourself!‘
    ‘No,’ Cranston replied, lifting the goblet. ‘I’ll find serenity at the bottom of this cup.‘
    Benedicta watched in disbelief as Cranston drained his drink in one large gulp and boomed for more, smacking his lips, gently burping and belching. Benedicta bit her lower lip to stifle her laughter.
    ‘Well, Brother.’ Cranston patted his broad girth. ‘With apologies to the Lady Benedicta, what do you make of Mowbray’s death?’ Cranston licked his lips. ‘Or Sir Ralph’s?’
    Athelstan leaned against the table and ran his finger round the rim of the wine goblet ‘First, we have found that Sir Ralph was probably murdered by someone who entered the Tower by crossing an ice-bound moat. Secondly, Mowbray was lured to his death by the tocsin sounding. Thirdly, both murders are certainly linked with Sir Ralph’s dreadful betrayal of Bartholomew Burghgesh in Cyprus so many years ago.’ Athelstan smiled at Benedicta’s quizzical face. ‘You are puzzled, My Lady. Well, so are we. First, how can someone enter the Tower, murder Sir Ralph, then leave the fortress without being noticed? Secondly, why did Sir Ralph just lie there and allow his throat to be cut so savagely that his head was almost hacked from his body? You saw the corpse, Sir John, and the chamber? There was no sign of any struggle nor did the guards hear anything. Thirdly, who rang the tocsin bell and, at the same time, so subtly arranged for Mowbray to fall from the parapet?’
    The coroner’s face grew longer at Athelstan’s every word. ‘And the list of suspects,’ the friar continued remorselessly, ‘still stands. We may have met the murderer, yet it may equally be someone in the Tower or the city about whom we know nothing.‘
    ‘I do not know the full story,’ Benedicta interrupted, ‘but there is rejoicing in Southwark at Sir Ralph’s death.’ She lowered her voice. ‘Pike the ditcher says it is the work of the Great Community. The secret peasant leaders wish to weaken the city before they organise their great revolt.’
    ‘Nonsense!’ Cranston slurred, now on his third cup of sack. ‘Pike the ditcher, with all due respect, My Lady Benedicta, should keep his mouth shut and his neck safe! Sir Ralph was not murdered by any peasant.’
    Athelstan sipped from his wine cup and made a face at the sourness of the drink. ‘One person we have not met, My Lord Coroner, is the merchant Adam Horne. Benedicta, before we go on to meet Simon in the Fleet prison, there are certain enquiries to make. You will accompany us?’ Benedicta agreed, so they rose and left, Cranston bawling abuse at the hapless taverner. Outside it was growing dark, only a red glow showed where the sun had set. Cranston steadied himself carefully on the icy cobbles and stared at the sky.
    ‘Why is it always red at night?’
    ‘Some say,’ Athelstan replied, ‘it’s because the sun slips into hell, but I think that’s an old wives’ tale. Come on, Sir John.’
    Athelstan slipped round the coroner, tactfully linked one arm through his and, with Benedicta on the other side, crossed the now deserted Cheapside. The stalls were being packed away, the last iron-rimmed carts crashed along to Newgate or east to Aldgate. Weary apprentices and traders locked their shutters and put out lantern horns. The bell of St Mary Le Bow began to toll the curfew, the sign that all trading should cease, as four urchins pulled a huge yule log up to the door of one of the great merchants’ houses. Cranston stopped to enquire directions of one of the market stewards who sat in his little toll booth on the corner of Wood Street The fellow pointed down to the corner of the Mercery and Lawrence Street.
    ‘You will find the Horne house there,’ he said. ‘A fine place, with a huge, black-timbered door and a coat of arms above it.’
    They turned, staying in the centre of Cheapside as the melting snow began