The Nightingale Gallery Read online

  Cranston made the man repeat the message as he reluctantly took them out of the main hall and up the wide, spacious stairs to one of the duke’s private chambers. Athelstan gazed around and nodded. Yes, this would do. A small fire had been lit in the hearth. The room, possibly used as a chancery by the duke, was dominated by a long table with chairs down either side and a high-backed, throne-like seat at the top. The steward left Cranston and Athelstan, who stood examining the exquisite hangings on the wall and a small cupboard full of manuscripts bound with the costliest leather and vellum. A servant brought them some wine and sugared pastries which Cranston immediately attacked. Another servant entered, a young page who announced in a high, shrill voice that the duke had received Sir John’s message and would be with him as soon as dignity and circumstances would allow.

  An hour candle placed on the table under the window had burnt a complete ring before Cranston heard footsteps outside. He and Athelstan rose as Gaunt swept into the room. Beside the duke was the young king, a silver chaplet around his head. Uncle and nephew were dressed identically in purple gowns edged with gold. The young king looked serene though Gaunt seemed angry and troubled, as if he resented Cranston’s message. He slumped into the chair at the end of the table and ordered a servant to bring in a similar one for his nephew. Chief Justice Fortescue slid in like a spider, scuttling across to sit next to the Duke. He was followed by Sir Richard Springall and his household. The merchant was flushed with drink; he grinned at Cranston and Athelstan as if they were lifelong friends; Dame Ermengilde, her nose in the air, chose to ignore them. Father Crispin and Buckingham smiled wanly whilst Lady Isabella looked decidedly agitated.

  ‘Are we all assembled?’ Gaunt asked sardonically.

  Chief Justice Fortescue glanced around and nodded. ‘Yes, Your Grace, we are all here.’

  Athelstan noticed that a burly serjeant-at-arms had just stepped into the room.

  ‘I want this chamber guarded closely!’ the regent ordered. ‘No one is to leave or enter without my permission. Do you understand?’

  The man nodded. Outside Athelstan could hear him shouting orders, the sound of running feet and the clash of arms. He gazed at the assembled company. Sir Richard Springall had sobered up surprisingly quickly. Lady Isabella was looking across at him, nervously twisting her fingers. Dame Ermengilde, even though she was in the presence of royalty, sat staring at the wall opposite her. The rest of them kept their eyes fastened on the duke, waiting to see what lay behind his summons.

  Gaunt leaned forward, the jewels on his tanned hands flashing in the candlelight.

  ‘Sir John, coroner of the city, I am pleased to see you. And even though you were not present at the banquet, it is obvious that you have drunk well. I hope your day was a fruitful one?’

  Cranston caught the touch of menace in the duke’s words and glanced at Athelstan.

  The friar acknowledged the regent and the young king. ‘My Lord of Gaunt, Your Grace, we were given a commission to investigate the true causes and purposes behind Sir Thomas Springall’s death, and in consequence the truth behind other deaths equally unfortunate.’ He rose to his feet. ‘Your Grace, I ask your indulgence but I would like us to perform a small mummer’s play, a useful introduction to what we are about to declare.’

  Gaunt gazed at the friar crossly. ‘What is it, Brother?’ he asked.

  ‘A game, Uncle!’ The young king suddenly spoke up, childish glee replacing the mask of royalty on his face. He clapped his hands.

  ‘Your Grace,’ Gaunt smiled thinly at his nephew, ‘perhaps you should not be here?’

  ‘Perhaps I should!’ the young boy piped back. ‘I want to be. It is my right!’

  Athelstan was surprised at the precociousness of the child and, despite his tender years, the sway he held over his formidable uncle.

  Gaunt sighed. ‘Brother, we are in your hands. Though I warn you,’ he gestured threateningly, ‘don’t waste my time or engage us in meddlesome, wasteful tricks. I am here for the truth!’

  CHAPTER 10

  Athelstan pointed to the chamber door.

  ‘My Lord of Gaunt, let us pretend that behind that door lies someone you dearly love.’

  Gaunt glared back at him.

  ‘The door is locked and you are about to rouse them. What would you do?’

  ‘A simple question! I would try the door, I would knock, I would hammer, I would shout!’

  ‘Thank you, Your Grace. Lady Ermengilde, you heard Father Crispin come up to rouse Sir Thomas that fateful morning. What happened?’

  The old dame had caught the drift of Athelstan’s words, her face losing some of its haughty composure. She narrowed her eyes.

  ‘I heard him come up. He tried the handle of the door of my son’s bed chamber. Then he walked away. He went to find Sir Richard.’

  ‘Now why was that, Father?’ Athelstan asked. ‘You went up to waken your master - he had asked to be roused early, remember? You went up as anyone would do, you tried the door, but then you went to get his brother. Why did you not try to rouse Sir Thomas Springall yourself? You tried the door but there was no sound from within. Anyone else would have pounded on the door, shouting Sir Thomas’s name. You failed to do so. You immediately walked away to rouse Sir Richard. Why?’

  ‘Because I thought that was the best thing to do.’

  ‘It was not the logical thing to do,’ Athelstan replied quickly. ‘The logical thing was to pound on the door and shout Sir Thomas’s name. You did not. It was as if you knew something was wrong.’

  The priest swallowed quickly but gazed coolly around the room.

  ‘What are you implying, Brother?’

  ‘At the moment I am implying nothing. Let us proceed a little further. Sir Richard comes upstairs with other members of the household. The door is forced. And inside?’

  ‘Why,’ the priest replied, ‘my master, Sir Thomas Springall, lying on the bed, poisoned.’

  ‘And what happened then? Precisely?’

  ‘I went across to look at Sir Thomas.’

  ‘No, he did not!’ Sir Richard thrust himself forward. ‘I did that. You came into the room with me but I did that!’

  ‘So what did you do, Father?’ Athelstan continued.

  ‘I just stood there.’

  ‘No, you did something else.’

  ‘Oh, yes. I picked up the wine cup and smelt it. I took it over to the window to look at the contents because its odour was strange.’

  ‘And when you went to the window, you passed the chess board. Then what?’

  ‘I pronounced the cup was poisoned. The rest you know.’

  ‘And how were you dressed?’

  ‘I told you. I had been outside, visiting the stables.’

  ‘You were wearing gloves? A cloak?’

  ‘Yes, I was.’

  ‘I will tell you this, priest,’ Athelstan replied, ‘you wore the gloves for a purpose. You see, you knew that Sir Thomas was already dead before you went into that chamber. You had arranged it that way. The wine cup was not poisoned. You took it to the window and poured in the potion which you had concealed in your glove. As you passed the chess board you took a piece from it, the bishop, the reason being that it was heavily coated with a certain poison.’

  Father Crispin’s face was marble white. He shook his head wordlessly.

  ‘This is what happened,’ Athelstan continued. ‘On the afternoon of the banquet, you engaged Sir Thomas in a game of chess. You played with all your skill and finesse and managed to trap Sir Thomas. The game broke off just before the meal. You knew how Sir Thomas hated to be beaten, you admitted that yourself. He would be absorbed in the moves so that when the game recommenced he could try to escape from the trap posed by your pieces. Now, I put this to you, sir. Just before the banquet, as people were coming down, you went up to Sir Thomas’s room, unnoticed by anyone else and, choosing a chess piece, coated it thickly with poison. Some time later Brampton took up the wine cup.

  ‘After the feast
was over, Sir Thomas retired to his chamber, locking the door behind him. Then he did what you intended him to do, what any good chess player would have done. He went across to the chess board, trying to work out the best method to escape the trap you had placed him in. He picked up the bishop, the piece under threat, moving it around the board, attempting to find a way out. Like anyone who is deeply puzzled, he would raise his fingers to his lips. Little did he know that every time he did so, he was poisoning himself. It would not have taken long. The poisons you had bought from the apothecary were potent. Sir Thomas may have felt strange from the first symptoms; he left the chess board and went to his bed where he later died.’

  ‘The next morning you came up to his chamber, gloved, because you knew you would have to touch the poison yourself. But you needed witnesses, you wanted to make it very clear that the blame lay with Brampton. Sir Richard entered the room with you, as did other members of the household. Like any people breaking into a room and finding someone unexpectedly dead, they gathered round the corpse. Meanwhile you had removed the chess piece, poisoned the wine cup and placed it back on the table.’

  ‘The cup now seemed the bringer of death and the blame was placed on Brampton.’

  The priest regained his wits.

  ‘That’s impossible!’ he said. ‘How could I know that Sir Thomas would touch the chess board after he had retired for that night?’

  ‘Oh, but you did,’ Cranston broke in. ‘You did, you admitted as much yourself. You said that Sir Thomas could not leave the chess board alone. And the only people that touched the cup were Brampton, Sir Thomas and yourself. Only after that was the poison detected in it.’

  ‘And I suppose that I am responsible for Brampton’s murder?’

  ‘Yes.’ Cranston took up the tale. ‘My good secretarius here, my faithful clerk, has established that Brampton probably went back to his room after the banquet had begun. He felt hurt by Sir Thomas’s accusation that he had been meddling with his private papers. Now, of course, Brampton had not. You had. However, we will return to that. You probably drugged Brampton.’

  ‘Drugged!’ the priest snapped. ‘Brampton wasn’t drugged! That’s nonsense!’

  He looked around the room, appealing for support, but Athelstan noticed how the others were beginning to distance themselves from the priest. Chief Justice Fortescue looked steadily at the table top. Gaunt had a smile on his twisted lips. The young king seemed totally absorbed. Cranston shook his head.

  ‘It’s no use lying, murderer,’ he snapped. ‘You know Brampton had drunk deeply that day. A servant told us as much. And you, Lady Isabella, didn’t you say your husband had broached his best cask of Bordeaux and that you sent a cup to Brampton as a peace offering?’

  ‘Yes, I did,’ she murmured. ‘No! I sent the cup up—’ she pointed at the priest ‘—but you poured it, Father Crispin. Yes, it was your idea. It was drugged!’ she exclaimed.

  ‘That night,’ Athelstan interrupted, ‘after the rest of the household retired, Father Crispin went up to Brampton’s room. You are a strong young man, Crispin. Brampton was small and light; he lived on the second storey of the house, very near the stairs to the garret. You took him off his bed and carried him up, half sat him on the table, fastened the waiting noose round his neck and left him to hang, God save his soul! But poor Brampton knew for a while that he was choking to death. He grabbed the rope but it was useless. His breath was choked off and his unshriven soul fled into the darkness.’

  Athelstan went and stood over the priest. ‘You are steeped in mortal sin,’ he murmured. ‘Your soul is red, scarlet and wounded. You killed that man but you made a mistake! Why should Brampton walk up to the garret with his boots off. And, if he had worn them, he would have kicked them off in his death throes.’ Athelstan bent down, his face only inches from Crispin’s. ‘But let us say he did go up without his boots. The garret was dirty, there was broken glass on the floor, yet the soles of Brampton’s feet, even after his corpse had been cut down, were clean and unscarred. Why? Because his feet never touched the ground.’

  ‘Vechey was murdered too, wasn’t he?’ Lady Isabella stammered.

  ‘Yes,’ Athelstan replied. ‘And do you know why? When the door to your husband’s chamber was forced, Vechey came in. At one point he must have looked at the chess board after Crispin had removed the poisoned piece to clean it.’

  ‘Of course,’ Dame Ermengilde trumpeted. ‘That’s why Vechey kept talking about there being only thirty-one. He noticed the missing piece. Vechey always coveted the Syrians!’

  ‘And then the piece was returned,’ Athelstan answered, ‘which only perplexed him further. Nevertheless, Vechey’s sharp eyes cost him his life and he, too, was marked down for murder lest he voice his doubts.’

  ‘God knows how you managed that murder!’ Cranston bawled. ‘The red-haired whore may have been a lure in your pay. It may, cunning priest, even have been you in disguise. I wonder, a thorough search being made, if we wouldn’t find a red wig and dress in your possession. But, there again, you made a mistake. Vechey was probably drugged or knocked on the head. You hung him up under an arch of London Bridge, but the water level would have made such a death impossible. You hoped no one would notice that.’

  ‘Wait!’ Crispin cried. ‘You allege I had the poison, but you know a lady very similar to our Lady Isabella in dress and appearance bought the identical poison from the apothecary, Simon Foreman!’

  ‘Yes,’ Cranston said, ‘and that’s your third mistake. I did ask Lady Isabella about that but you were not in the room. Remember, we asked you to withdraw? Lady Isabella, Sir Richard, is that correct?’

  Both nodded their heads.

  ‘And did you ever tell the priest about my question?’

  Again, both shook their heads wordlessly.

  ‘You couldn’t have overhead!’ Dame Ermengilde snapped. ‘Because I stood near the door of the hall. I tried to listen but I couldn’t hear anything.’

  ‘The only way you could know,’ Athelstan murmured, ‘was because you dressed in clothes secretly borrowed from Lady Isabella’s wardrobe. Your head was hidden by a red wig as well as a hood. You went to Nightshade House and bought the poison.’ Athelstan sipped from his wine cup.

  ‘You would enjoy that, wouldn’t you?’

  The priest refused to answer.

  ‘But such subterfuge!’ Lady Isabella cried.

  ‘Oh, Crispin planned well. One of Brampton’s buttons was placed near your husband’s manuscripts to start the tragedy. However, in case something went wrong and the poison was traced . . .’

  ‘What better person than you to implicate, Lady Isabella?’ Cranston observed. ‘After all, you were playing the two-backed beast with your husband’s brother!’

  Lady Isabella looked away whilst Crispin placed his head in his hands. Dame Ermengilde turned to Cranston, her eyes full of malice.

  ‘You are not such a fool, Master Coroner. But haven’t you forgotten a few things? If my son had touched the poisoned chess pieces, his hands would have been stained. And how do you explain Allingham’s death?’

  Athelstan looked down at the priest. Father Crispin raised his head and stared unblinkingly back.

  ‘Remember, our murderer also bestowed the rites of the Church. He made sure that the hands of both Sir Thomas Springall and Master Allingham were washed before he anointed them with holy oils.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Sir Richard whispered. ‘And the anointing took place immediately!’

  ‘So there was no stain,’ Athelstan continued conversationally, ‘as in all his murders, no real evidence. You are a killer, Father. An assassin. And we know why. You remember the young page boy who fell from the window? Sir Thomas lusted after him, in fact he found you wrote a love poem to him. We have seen it. I suspect you tried to seduce the boy. God knows what happened. Tell us, Father, did he jump because he was frightened or did you push him?’

  The priest glared back at him but made no answer.

 
‘I think Sir Thomas knew the truth but dared not accuse you openly. After all, he was guilty of the same sin of sodomy as you. Of course, being a chaplain, you were privy to the secrets of others. So what Sir Thomas did was take his revenge through the carving, the panel he was going to use in the coronation pageant and later hang in the chapel.’ Athelstan glanced at Sir Richard. ‘Do you remember the carving? What was it of?’

  ‘A shoemaker being dragged away by devils.’

  ‘Did you ever look at the shoemaker’s feet?’

  ‘No.’

  Cranston banged the heel of his boot on the floor.

  ‘Poor Father Crispin, always hobbling around, using his injury as a banner. But when he so chooses, he puts on his boots with their raised heel - and, behold, he can walk like any of us. That’s true, isn’t it, Priest? You were out riding the day Allingham died?’

  Father Crispin dismissed Cranston’s accusation with a flicker of his eyes.

  ‘Sir John is correct,’ Athelstan took up the story. ‘A priest can go anywhere, be it in his master’s chamber to poison a chess piece, around the house at the dead of night to comfort poor Brampton, to say prayers at St Mary Le Bow . . . whereas in fact on the night Vechey died Father Crispin disguised himself as the red-haired whore and went hunting his prey amongst the riverside stews.’ Athelstan paused and looked quickly at Fortescue. ‘I told Sir John that there was more than one murderer. In a sense I was correct. You are two people, Father, the hobbling priest and the cunning assassin.’

  Athelstan noticed how the Chief Justice’s face had become so pale it looked as if he was going to vomit.

  ‘Of course, Crispin,’ Athelstan continued, ‘you had your accomplice. Someone you had met at your master’s table. Someone who could tell you where we went so you could have assassins lying in waiting. You remember the gospel, Father, and the man who claimed his name was Legion, so many devils possessed him? He would recognise you, Priest. You murdered for revenge, for profit, but also for the sheer malicious delight of plot and counter-plot.’