The House of the Red Slayer

and rode back through the darkness, chuckling to himself at Sir John’s reaction to his news. He hoped Lady Maude had heard his announcement about Vincentius’ departure. Perhaps, the friar concluded, it was all for the best.
    Philomel suddenly slipped on a strip of ice. Athelstan groaned in despair, dismounted and, gathering the reins in his hands, gently guided the old horse along the darkened pathway. Above him the houses rose sheer and sombre. Outside each of the great Cheapside mansions an oil lamp burned, but as Athelstan turned the corner at St Peter Cornhill and went down Gracechurch into Bridge Street, the tracks became darker. He had to pick his way carefully round the mounds of refuse, night soil and scraps of food where rats gnawed and scampered. Behind him a door slammed and a night bird nesting in the eaves of a house flew out in a burst of black feathers, making Athelstan jump. Beggars whined for alms. A whore stood on the corner, the orange wig straggling across her raddled face made all the more ghastly in the light of the candle she cradled in her hand. She cackled at Athelstan and made a rude gesture. He sketched the sign of the cross in her direction. A city bully-boy leaning against the door of an ale-house saw the lonely figure and felt his wooden knife hilt. But when he glimpsed Athelstan’s tonsure and the crucifix round his neck, he thought better of it.
    Athelstan moved on, relieved to see the soldiers in the torchlight guarding London Bridge. Its gates were closed but the city archers recognised ‘the coroner’s chaplain’, as they called Athelstan, and let him through.
    The friar crossed the bridge, the sound of Philomel’s hoofbeats hollow on the wooden planks. It was an eerie experience. Usually the bridge was busy but now it was silent and shrouded in a thick river mist. Athelstan had the ghostly impression of walking across some chasm between heaven and hell. The gulls nesting in the wooden arches below flew out, shrieking in protest at this unexpected disturbance. Athelstan remembered the ravens in the Tower. Another death there, he thought, two if he included the bear’s. Athelstan felt sorry for the beast.
    ‘Perhaps it was for the best,’ he murmured to himself. ‘Never have I seen so unhappy an animal.’ He recalled the teaching of some of his Franciscan brethren who, following the preaching of their founder, maintained all animals were God’s creation and should never be ill-treated or kept in captivity.
    Athelstan passed the silent, darkened chapel of St Thomas of Canterbury in the centre of the bridge. The wards-men on the Southwark bank shouted at him; some of them even wondered if he was a ghost. Athelstan sang out his name and they let him through, teasing him gently about his unexpected appearance.
    The friar led Philomel through the dark alleyways of Southwark. He felt safer here. He was known and no one would dare accost him. He passed a tavern where a boy, to earn a few crusts, stood just within the doorway, sweetly singing a carol. Athelstan stopped and listened to words promising warmth and cheer. He patted Philomel on the neck. ‘Where will we spend Christmas, eh, old friend?’ he asked and walked on. ‘Perhaps Lady Cranston might invite me, now her relatives are not coming from the West Country.’
    He stopped abruptly. ‘Lady Maude’s relatives!’ he murmured to the dark, quietened street, and felt a shiver go up his spine. ‘Strange,’ he murmured. ‘Something so small, a mere froth on the day’s happenings.’ He rubbed the side of his face. Lady Maude’s words stirred memories of something else he had heard.
    He almost dragged Philomel back to St Erconwald’s, so eagerly the destrier snickered angrily at him. Athelstan stabled the old war horse, ensured all was well in the church, and guiltily remembered his anger earlier in the day. Bona-venture was apparently out courting so Athelstan went across to the house, built up the fire and hastily ate a piece of bread. After a few bites he tossed it into the fire as the bread was stale, and poured himself a goblet of watered wine. He cleared the rough table top and began to list all he knew about the murders in or near the Tower.
    The thought which had sparked his memory in the street outside might, he speculated, be the key to resolving the entire problem. He smiled as he remembered old Father Anselm’s oft-repeated axiom in his lectures on logic. ‘If a problem exists, a solution must