Falconer and the Rain of Blood Read online

  Emerging hard by East Gate, he had to step back sharply into the mouth of the lane as a horseman rode hard in through the entrance to the town. The rider saw Falconer only at the last minute and pulled his horse up abruptly with a warning cry.

  ‘Have a care, man. You were nearly under my horse’s feet.’

  Falconer was inclined to suggest the rider in his turn might care to exercise some care, but looking up, he saw the man was as shocked as he had been. The stocky figure of a crusader knight sat firmly on his massive charger, which was lathered in sweat and covered in the dust of the road it had travelled. The rider himself was no better off, covered as he was in dust, cut through on his face by runnels of sweat. He looked dead beat, his bearded face drawn and lined with utter weariness. Falconer bowed mockingly, and waved the rider past with a wave of his arm. The knight grunted, and pricked his horse forwards with a jab of his heels. Falconer watched as the horse and rider plodded on at a more sedate pace into the town.

  Falconer turned and acknowledged the watchman at the gate, who had stood open-mouthed at the near collision.

  ‘Take care, Tom, or you may catch a fly in that.’

  Old Tom Inge clapped his mouth closed involuntarily, and then waved a finger at Falconer.

  ‘Have a care yourself, Master William, or I may close the gate before you can get back in.’

  Falconer smiled.

  ‘Then I shall have to pay the penalty, and supply you with a jug of ale as usual.’

  Blushing, the old man grunted, knowing that Falconer’s jest had the ring of truth. Inge was known to accept a drink by way of allowing people back through the wicket gate after curfew. He turned back into his little box that protected him from the worst of the weather and the cold at night, and Falconer passed through the gate and on towards the leper hospital.

  *

  While Falconer delved into his past at Bartlemas, another man was also thinking about matters in Oxford. Edward was a handsome man despite the strange droop to his right eye that he had inherited from his father, King Henry. At the age of thirty-six, he still had a thick mane of black hair. And he was a tall man, standing head and shoulders above the common crowd. His long arms and legs gave him an advantage in swordplay and mastering a stallion. They also gave him his nickname of Longshanks, though no-one used that soubriquet any longer. Last year he had been crowned Edward, King of England, and was now travelling with his court around his kingdom. They had just descended on Woodstock with his retinue of cooks, carters, clerks, grooms, doctors, tailors, huntsmen and knights. Sometimes his court could swell to six hundred, though today he was travelling with a third of that number, even taking into account the merchants, players, beggars and prostitutes who also tagged along. He was actually travelling light — for a king — as his trip was one with a particular purpose. Now, pacing the great chamber that was his audience room in Woodstock Palace, a day’s journey north of Oxford, he suddenly felt diminished. He turned on the patient, soberly-clad man who attended him.

  ‘Damn it, Robert. Am I to be circumscribed by lawyers and pen-pushers?’

  It seemed to the king that the times were an age of lawyers and quibblers, and not of warriors and monarchs any more. He waved his hands above his head as though he were trying to swat away so many buzzing flies. Robert Burnell, Chancellor of England, shrugged his shoulders, not caring to inflame Edward’s anger any further. He could have pointed out that it had been the king’s idea to set up the Commission into local government, but that would only make matters worse. Burnell knew Edward had an orderly mind, and was seeking to consolidate the laws of England in much the same way as he saw his fellow rulers doing across Europe. But his chief purpose in so doing was to define royal rights and possessions, not to cede rights to those beneath him. Edward had a well-developed sense of his own importance and power. Now he was angry.

  Burnell rode out the storm of Edward’s anger, knowing the real cause of the explosion. It was nothing to do with the fifty-one laws set out in the First Statute of Westminster, and now approved by bishops, abbots, barons, earls and knights of the realm. The new laws covered an astonishing numbers of subjects dear to Edward’s heart — extortion by royal officers, lawyers and bailiffs; writs and methods of procedure in civil and criminal cases; the custom of wrecks; freedom of elections and so on. This had all pleased Edward, and when the Parliament also forbade usury to the Jews, he felt he had achieved a great deal in a short time. No, Burnell knew that, despite his anger, the king secretly loved all this casuistry.

  What had actually peeved Edward was Llewellyn ap Gruffyd’s refusal to attend his coronation. Ostensibly, it was all over the fact that Llewellyn’s own renegade brother, Daffyd, had sought refuge in England and whether Edward should or not have give him succour. But Edward was sure it was more to do with the Prince of Wales — so called — chancing his arm in a battle of wills with him. Though Llewellyn had bent the knee to Henry, Edward’s father, and was seen as a petty vassal to the King of England, the prince thought he could improve his own esteem at home by avoiding bowing before the new king. Besides he owed thousands of marks to Edward, which he did not have. So it had all come down to a quibble over the treaty Llewellyn had signed with Henry, and that was why Edward was railing at lawyers.

  As Burnell waited patiently, a light flickered in Edward’s eyes. Like his father, the king had a droopy right eyelid, and for a moment it seemed he was winking at his Chancellor. Burnell knew better, however, and kept his own eyes to the ground. Edward had come to a decision, and began to explain it.

  ‘We thought to be magnanimous, by taking the court to Chester. There, the Prince of Wales could have made his due obedience, but he didn’t. Time has now run out for him.’

  Robert Burnell inclined his head, and nodded his approval of Edward’s clever ruse. The trip to Chester, from where the king’s retinue was returning, had actually been a trap for Llewellyn. The options before him had been either to meet with Edward and bow the knee, or to appear rebellious and refuse to meet him. Llewellyn had decided that to agree to meet Edward was impossible for him now. But by refusing to meet Edward so close to his own domain, he had fallen into the king’s trap The Welsh prince had incautiously chosen the worse option, just as Edward and Burnell had thought he would.

  Robert Burnell was a man from modest origins, who maintained an air of quiet, self-effacing charm. He had made himself indispensable to Edward even before he became king, and at one time had been spoken of as a future Archbishop of Canterbury. His attraction to women, however, and the production of at least five bastard children had eventually ruled him out of that race. But now, he was in a far more powerful position as Chancellor. He was often able to place an idea in Edward’s head that might come to fruition as the king’s own idea. The Chester ruse had actually been his. He now chanced his arm on a matter he knew also bothered the king.

  ‘Perhaps, as we are close by Oxford, we can find a way to resolve the other little matter that I know vexes you, your Majesty. I have good cause to go to Oxford on your behalf to press de Bosco on the Welsh students. I could be your emissary there.’

  There was a good reason the Burnell should visit Oxford in Edward’s place. There was a long-standing belief that any king who entered the university town would soon thereafter lose his throne. Edward was not superstitious, but it was prudent not to tempt fate. The business in Oxford could well be dealt with by Burnell, and the king knew it. Without saying a word, Edward turned his gaze from the window out of which he had been looking, and faced Burnell. This time, the little, sombrely-clad man was sure it was a wink of approval that the king gave him.

  Chapter Two

  Feast of St John of Chrysostom, 13th September

  He knelt before the altar, the stone seeping cold into his knees. He raised his arms in adoration of the crucifix suspended high in front of him. Then he fell forwards on to the chilly slabs, his face turned aside so his left cheek struck the stone floor jarringly. He made the shape of the cross
with his outstretched arms and body, hugging the coldness to him in a sort of religious ecstasy. He tried to calm his boiling brain, but he couldn’t. The theft of the first book had been so simple.

  The chest in which it had lurked, the darkness of the interior suited to the book’s murky and disgusting content, was in a communal area in the hall. The purpose of the chest’s location was so that a student lodging at the hall could borrow a text for study. But the room was often left unattended, and anyone could walk in from the street and claim a book for their own. Of course there was a ledger on a stand next to the chest, where a borrower was required to make their mark. For a while, book in hand, he had contemplated the half-filled page, the space a tempting invitation to make a statement of his purpose. But he had resisted the temptation, satisfying himself with the theft alone. He had walked out with the book in the sleeve of his grey robe.

  The book now resided under the simple pallet in his starkly bare cell along with others he had taken since. Their presence was still a rankling sore, for he had not thought beyond the act of stealing. Now, he tossed around his brain the possibilities open to him. He could expose the books’ heresies in public, but that would only serve to disseminate its contagion. No, he had known the minute he had stolen the latest book that he would have to destroy them all. The idea at first filled him with horror — the destruction of any book was an action barely to be contemplated when each precious text took a scribe so long to copy. But the contents of the books were an abomination, so they deserved no better fate than to be burned in the fires of Hell. A fire that should be shared with their authors. This thought gave relief to his concerns about what had happened yesterday, when he had had to resort to a violent act. In his mind this was now justified.

  He sighed in pleasure at the resolution of his quandary, and his breath blew out in a chilly draught across the floor of the chapel. As his cheek grew numb from the cold slab under it, so his brain cooled from its former fervour, and he began to talk with God.

  *

  Sir Hugo de Wolfson awoke that morning in his bed in Dagville’s Inn with his throat feeling raw. He ran his fingers through his thick, but greying hair and sat up. For a moment he felt dizzy, but shook his head, and forced his weary bones from the bed. After dressing, it was all he could do to swallow some watered ale and bread. And even then he had to soak the dry bread in the ale to make it palatable. It had been his intention to travel onwards to his destination in the north that day, but he felt weak from a feverish cold. He resolved to recover by spending another day in Oxford, and told the inn-keeper, Thomas Dagville, so. He also made enquiry for a physick, and Dagville gave him direction to an apothecary in Kepeharm Lane off Fish Street.

  ‘You cannot miss it for the lane is almost opposite the House of Converts.’

  Dagville was making reference to a sturdy stone house in the middle of Great Jewry. The people of Oxford knew little of its occupants, but as its rents were paid to the main Domus Conversorum set up by the old king in London, they assumed it served the same purpose. To accommodate those Jews who sought conversion from their faith. Dagville laughed cruelly at the situation of the Jews.

  ‘There have been some who lodged inside, but they are so stubborn it is said that few have come to the true faith. You see how foolish they are. The Jews do not have the wit even to understand the wrongness of their ways.’

  Dagville failed to mention that amidst the ‘errant’ Jews who lived in Oxford was a physick who was far superior in his knowledge and skills to the local Christian apothecary he had directed the crusader knight to. Old Samson was a wise and skilful Jewish healer, who Thomas Dagville’s own wife had resorted to for help with her last, difficult birth when Spicer the apothecary had failed her. Dagville thought it better not to send this stiff crusader to a Jew though. So he recommended Will Spicer of Kepeharm Lane instead. De Wolfson pushed himself out of his chair, his bones aching.

  ‘I thank you, Dagville. It is nothing but a small fever. But I have still to travel far, and do not wish to be delayed any longer than need be. I am sure Spicer will fix me up.’

  De Wolfson tugged his cloak around him, though the day was already warm, and stepped out of the inn into the mayhem that was a normal market day in Oxford.

  Oxford was well situated to benefit from trade moving from north to south and east to west. Inside the walls, the town was cut into four by roads running in those directions, so that the very layout of the town was in the form of a Christian cross laying on its side. Northgate Street ran down across Carfax into Fish Street, through Great Jewry to South Gate. Great Bailey in the west ran from the castle where the constable, Peter Bullock resided, through Carfax in the opposite direction, and along High Street to East Gate. These crossed roads teemed with traders, ranging from the straw-sellers in East Gate, past the pig market, wood-merchants, purveyors of earthenware, to glove-makers and bakers of good white bread. From South Gate the stalls were home to fishmongers, tanners and sellers of faggots, through to the corn-merchants at North Gate. The houses behind the stalls were only two stories high but stretched back a long way behind their narrow frontages. They were huddled in nature, cheek-by-jowl, and close to the ground from which they rose, as if rendered from the mud of the streets. It made the thirteen parish churches of Oxford all the more striking with their tall spires reaching up to heaven.

  The ailing crusader knight at first fought against the flow of people. A group of young clerks filled the roadway, some clad in sober clothes, some in parti-coloured tunics. One of the more sober, grey-robed youths was reading a book and he bumped into de Wolfson. On hearing a curse, he might have argued. But thought better of it when he looked up to see a sturdy knight staring him in the face. He stepped aside, a scowl on his face, and walked on, his mind back deep in his tome. De Wolfson would have pressed on in his haste to find the apothecary, but he soon tired of the effort of pushing through the crowd, and let his pace conform to the slow passage of shoppers. Soon, he was moving with the flow of the crowd rather than against it. Making this more leisurely way towards Carfax, he lingered over a stall displaying well stitched leather gloves, wiping his runny nose with his fingers before picking up one of the samples to test its quality.

  ‘It is the best of cut and stitching, sir knight, and well able to stand the vicissitudes of battle, even in the heat of Outremer.’

  John Burewald, the sharp-eyed glove-seller, had expertly assessed his potential customer. The stocky figure of de Wolfson was clad in a loose nondescript tunic under his cloak, which now hung open, but it was easy to spot the broad shoulders of a fighter. And his face still bore the effect of the unbearable Holy Land sun. De Wolfson merely grunted, as he was not seeking to buy gloves. He had a pair of stained but still serviceable gloves in his saddlebags back at the inn. He shoved the glove he had picked up back at the man, and moved on before the glover became a nuisance. At Carfax, he turned south, as instructed by Dagville, and followed the crowds down Fish Street.

  He stopped to admire a display of fresh fish, the glittering eyes staring back at him blankly. Alice Lane was standing beside him buying pickled herring which she hoped would stretch to feed her large family back home. He was caught with a fit of coughing, and hawked and spat in the foul gutter that ran the length of the street. Alice shrank back in disgust, and de Wolfson grunted an apology, almost knocking over a Franciscan friar as he stepped away. Drifting on past other fish stalls at the pace of the general mob, he realised when he came to the South Gate that he had missed his way. He turned back and retraced his steps, trying to recall from Dagville’s instructions if Kepharm Lane was to the right or left. He was momentarily distracted by the sight of a pretty woman emerging from a house on the opposite side of the street. Her shapely figure fitted her flowing green dress well, and her unruly red hair escaped the confines of her linen snood, suggesting a woman of lively temperament. She crossed the street ahead of him, and disappeared down a narrow lane bounded on one side by a sturdy stone building with a sq
uare tower. De Wolfson recalled the landlord’s mention of the House of Converts.

  ‘This must be the building,’ he muttered to himself. ‘I was to turn here, was I not? But which way?’

  His head ached, and he cursed his fever-addled brains. But, mindful of the pretty red-head and the fact he had not slaked his lust in a month or more, he followed the vision of pulchritude down the narrow lane. He was soon to realise that he was going in quite the wrong direction, but by then he had lost the red-head, and found himself after a few twists and turns walking down Grope Lane. Not that he knew its name, but the familiar sign of a brothel put any idea of finding a remedy for his fever out of his mind. He scratched at his crotch and stepped through the open doorway.

  It was still morning, and the house was quiet, but Sal Dockerell, the brothel-keeper, bustled out of the back room. She recognised a good customer when she saw one, and when the stocky knight laid down a silver coin, she sent him upstairs to spend some time with a raven-haired slut called Peggy Jardine. Just to make sure, Sal put the coin in her mouth and bit it. She could tell it was a good one.

  *

  William de Bosco was the chancellor of the university, and today was not the first time he had regretted taking the post. Others before him had actively sought the position, and used its power to further their own ends. The previous incumbent, Thomas Bek, had indeed aspired to be Chancellor of England, but his hopes had been dashed when he used the powers of his position to bring to trial a certain regent master for murder. His idea had been that, taking the responsibility away from the King’s authorised officers and assuming it himself, would raise his profile once the master was found guilty. The case had seemed straightforward, but friends of the regent master had turned it on its head, and Bek’s reputation had been ruined. De Bosco had been chosen to replace him as a safe pair of hands, who had no great ambition for himself. He was a quiet man, grey by nature and in appearance. For well nigh two years he had occupied the Chancellor’s seat almost without anyone realising. But now he had a problem that he couldn’t ignore.