Bloodstone(73)
Cranston grunted.
‘Reseal the candle with a wax plug and you have nothing less than a vase of oil.’
‘If you light the wick,’ Athelstan agreed, ‘the flame burns down, the wax dissolves and the conflagration begins. The lower the oil sits in the hollowed-out candle, the longer it takes.’
‘I’ve seen it done,’ the chandler observed ruefully. ‘Sir John, as coroner, you must have encountered tallow-makers, candle-fashioners who use cheap materials within a shell of wax?’
‘I have,’ Cranston drank from his posset cup, ‘which explains why the guild’s regulations are so stringent against such a practice.’
‘That and more,’ the firedrake explained. ‘This barrel was as dry as tinder. Inside it was a small pouch of oil. The false candle was perilous enough but the oil would make it truly dangerous. You must have seen conflagrations; people forget how fast flames can move. I’ve seen fires in dried forests course swifter than a fleeing deer. Burning oil is even worse.’ He waggled a finger. ‘Very dangerous – it turned our candle into a fountain of spitting flame.’
‘So,’ Athelstan drained his cup, ‘somebody entered Brokersby’s chamber. They placed a wine skin, one full of oil sprinkled with salt-petre, under his bed. The tallow candle was replaced with a false one. Brokersby either lit it or let it burn as he was accustomed to. He retired to bed, his belly full of wine, an opiate, or both. The candle eventually disintegrated in a shower of flame which would swiftly reach the pouch of oil hidden away.’ Athelstan crossed himself. ‘The bed was of dry wood, linen sheets and woollen blankets, ideal fuel. Brokersby may have woken and tried to stagger out of danger but the fire was all around him. The oil-rich flames would have turned him into a living torch. My friends,’ Athelstan rose and bowed, ‘I thank you heartily but your hypothesis leaves one tantalizing question.’ He stared down at them. ‘Why? Why kill any soul but especially why like that, the artifice, the subtle cunning, why?’
Cranston escorted the firedrake, rewarded with good silver, back to the watergate. Athelstan took to wandering the abbey. He felt agitated. The buildings seemed to crowd in around him. The statues and carvings appeared to draw closer, making him more aware of sightless eyes, stone smiles and frozen glances. He became acutely alert to the dappled light, the black alleyways and the yawning mouths of corridors. Bells tolled. Monks slipped here and there on different duties. Athelstan sensed a change: their mood was colder, more distant. Bony white faces peered suspiciously out at him from hoods and cowls. Brothers turned and whispered to each other as he passed. Athelstan entered the church to pray before the lady altar. Afterwards he went and stood before the anker house but the anchorite was either asleep or pretended to be. Athelstan returned to his own chamber and tried to clear the fog of mystery behind the disappearance of the bloodstone and these horrid murders. Were they all connected? Athelstan wondered. Or should he look at Kilverby’s murder as separate from the rest? The Passio Christi did link Kilverby to the Wyvern Company. Another tie was Richer. Athelstan curbed his frustration. Ideally, Cranston should seize the Frenchman and hoist him off to the Tower for closer questioning. Richer however was a cleric, a monk. He would plead benefit of clergy and, within the day, every churchman in London would be stridently protesting.
SEVEN
‘Placitum: a case heard before a court.’
Next morning, after a troubled sleep, Athelstan celebrated a late Mass. As he divested he wondered if he should escape the abbey and return to St Erconwald’s for the day. Outside in the aisle the brothers were preparing their own crib, bringing in lifelike statues and arguing about whether the abbot wanted the Three Kings immediately or should they wait until the Epiphany. Athelstan was about to help when he glimpsed an inscription carved along the rim of the chantry altar. He swiftly translated the Latin. He was about to close his eyes in thankful prayer when he heard his name being called. Prior Alexander, unshaven and red-eyed, his black robe stained and blotched, pushed through the gossiping brothers to inform Athelstan that Cranston required him urgently near the watergate. Athelstan collected his cloak and writing tray and hurried down across Mortival meadow, pleasantly surprised by the change in the weather. The mist had lifted. The clouds were thinning and the weak sunlight gave the meadow a more springlike look. On the quayside Cranston, cloaked, booted and armed, stood with Wenlock and Mahant, similarly attired. The old soldiers looked heavy-eyed as if roused from an ale-sodden sleep. Moored along the quayside was a high-prowed barge with a covered awning in the stern. The prow boasted a snapping pennant of dark blue fringed with gold displaying the insignia of the Fisher of Men, a silver corpse rising from a golden sea. The barge was manned by six oarsmen dressed in black and gold livery – these were the Fisher of Men’s coven, outlaws and outcasts who’d rejected their own names and rejoiced in being called Maggot, Taffyhead, Badger, Brick-face, Gigglebrazen and Hackum. Standing on the barge was Icthus, the Fisher’s principal assistant, dressed in a simple black tunic, a strange creature who took the Greek name for fish, an apt enough title. The young man had no hair even on his brows or eyelids whilst his oval-shaped face and protuberant cod mouth made him look even more like a fish. Icthus raised a hand in greeting as Cranston broke off whispering heatedly with Wenlock and Mahant.