The House of the Red Slayer

Bladdersniff, I suppose you have come to discuss why my cemetery is violated and its graves robbed whilst you and the ward council do nothing about it?’
    Bladdersniff shook his head, while peering over his shoulder, back into the darkness of the church porch.
    ‘What is it, man? What’s over there?’
    The bailiffs mouth opened and shut like a landed carp. Athelstan stared more closely. The fellow looked as if he was going to vomit. His white face had a greenish tinge and the dark eyes were watery, as if Bladdersniff had been violently retching.
    ‘For God’s sake, man, what is it?’
    Again the bailiff looked back into the darkness.
    ‘It’s Tosspot!’ he mumbled.
    ‘What?’
    ‘Tosspot! Or, at least, part of him,’ Bladdersniff replied, beckoning the priest to follow him.
    Athelstan took a taper and went to where the bailiff stood over a dirty piece of canvas in a dark corner of the church porch. Bladdersniff pulled this open and Athelstan turned away in disgust. A man’s leg lay there, or at least part of it, cut above the knee as neatly and as sharply as a piece of cloth by an expert tailor. Athelstan stared at the bloody stump and mottle-hued skin.
    ‘Good God!’ he breathed, and caught the stench of corruption from the slightly puffed flesh. ‘Cover it up, man! Cover it up!’
    Athelstan doused the taper, walked out of the church and stood on the top step, drawing in deep breaths of fresh morning air. He heard Bladdersniff come up behind him. ‘What makes you think it was Tosspot?’
    ‘Oh, you remember, Father. Tosspot was always regaling his customers at the tavern with tales of his old war wound, an arrow in the leg. He was continually showing his scar as if it was some sacred relic.’
    Athelstan nodded.
    ‘Aye,’ he replied. ‘Old Tosspot would do that whenever he became drunk.’ The friar looked at the bailiff. ‘And that leg bears the same scar?’
    ‘Yes, Father, just above the shin.’
    ‘Where was it found?’
    ‘Do you want to see?’
    ‘Yes, I do.’
    Bladdersniff led him down Bridge Street, across Jerwald and into Longfish Alley which led down to Broken Wharf on the riverside. As he walked, Athelstan never spoke a word and the people who knew him stepped aside at the fierce, determined expression on the usually gentle priest’s face.
    Athelstan noticed little except the dirty, filthy slush of the streets they crossed. He ignored greetings and seemed totally unaware of the traders and hucksters behind their battered stalls and booths shouting for custom. Even the felons fastened tightly in the stocks failed to provoke his usual compassion, whilst he treated Bladdersniff as if the bailiff hardly existed. Athelstan felt sick at heart. Who would do that to poor Tosspot’s corpse? he wondered. How would it profit them? They reached Broken Wharf above the riverside. Bladdersniff took the friar by the arm and pointed down to the dirty mudflats where gulls and crows fought over the rubbish left on the riverside. Athelstan looked out across the Thames. The water looked as dirty and dark as his own mood. He noticed the great chunks of ice still floating, crashing together as they swirled down to thunder against the arches of London Bridge.
    ‘Where did you find it?’
    ‘Down there, Father,’ Bladdersniff brusquely replied. ‘On the mud, wrapped in that piece of canvas. An urchin looking for sea coal found it and brought it to one of the traders who recognised old Tosspot’s wound.’ The bailiff coughed nervously. ‘I have heard about the raids on your cemetery.’
    ‘Oh, you have? That’s good.’ Athelstan smiled falsely at him. ‘You think the limb was washed in by the river?’
    ‘Yes, I do. Now, at any other time, Father, the river would have swept it away, but the heavy ice has interfered with the current and the canvas bag was pushed back to the bank.’
    ‘So you are saying it must have been thrown in here?’
    ‘Yes, Father, either here or some place very close.’
    Athelstan looked to his left, along the mud flats and walls which stretched down to London Bridge. Too open, he reflected. No felon would dream of committing such a terrible act in a place where he could be seen. He looked to his right and the long row of great houses whose gardens stretched down to the riverside. A recent memory stirred. ‘I wonder,’ he murmured to himself. ‘I really do wonder
    ‘What, Father?’
    ‘Nothing, Master Bladdersniff. Go back to my church. Collect what is left